***BREAKING***Bernie Sanders Collapse Begins. His Campaign doesn't pay its workers 15$ minimum wage that he preaches

No surprise

He really is one of the biggest idiots on the planet.

His followers are a bit cultlike, so I don't know about "collapse," but then again he has already slipped to third or fourth in some polls...

Like a Christmas gift to the Warren campaign just in time for the 2nd debate.

Good! Self-destruction so he can't blame the Democrat party again.

Why would you unionize what are little more than volunteers? It's a temporary job that presumably one takes expecting a higher status and better paid professional job in the future-- kind of like an internship. This seems like it was short-sighted of Bernie.

Lies! LIES! DAMNED LIES!!!

Woke and Broke

[quote]Why would you unionize what are little more than volunteers? It's a temporary job that presumably one takes expecting a higher status and better paid professional job in the future--

Bernie's empty promises are coming home to bite him in the ass.

I can't understand for the LIFE of me what pinheads fall for Bernie's gibberish!

He's been nothing but a "Coffeehouse Socialist" dilettante since his youth, never doing more than hectoring people that they're wrong about EVERYTHING! I hope he keeps fucking them over, they deserve it!

Fantastic. Can't wait to see he and his cult members blaming everyone but themselves for his collapse.

Hilarious! Hope he fucks off into the sunset now. Finally.

Can't stand the cocksucker.

What a stupid mistake for him to make. Ridiculous. He is going to be pilloried for it. Deservedly so.

R12 this crazy fucker isn’t going anywhere, anymore than that crazy fucker Trump

Hope Warren destroys him at the debate.

Hahahahaha hahahaha hahahaha!

I hope Liz throat punches him and finishes him off.

Then the media can tell him to STFU and take up knitting because he's last century's news.

[quote]Can't wait to see he and his cult members

Oh, dear.

Hypocrite ugh. He's a millionaire.

I never liked this asshole. He's only in politics because he wants attention (a la AOC).

Looking at the supposed facts of the situation, this is technically an encroaching dispute, but we may see that its a very minor and temporary one that "they're not paid $15/hr" doesn't accurately describe, but media jumped into quickly.

If Sanders' doesn't deliver in the bargaining in the coming days/weeks, then there's actually something more juicy against him than the DL anti-Sanders cohort assumes.

Yes, R21. Bernie does have a long-standing way of going from bad to worse. Time will tell.

People like Buttiegieg, Bullock, and O'Rourke will be up for blood and this is the perfect opportunity to create a moment and start the trend upwards.

Ive never been anti semitic in the least,but Sanders makes me want to unfurl a swastika and goose step. Something about him makes my skin crawl,always has.

Bye babe, R24. Go practice your goosestep you fucking Nazi.

As for Bernie, I'm laughing my ass off right now. I live in VT where the legislature, a DEMOCRATICALLY CONTROLLED legislature, refused to vote in the 15.00 minimum or revise a family leave package that would benefit the poorer members of the community.

Now I know this is state-based, but Bernie is considered the elder statesman here by just about everybody, dems and repugs alike, and did he have something to say? NOPE.

Finally, he's an idiot, a political idiot. This isn't grassroots VT, where he'll be given the benefit of the doubt. He needed to sacrifice the finance manager of his campaign, put full time workers on the 15.00 per hour wage yesterday, apologize for his 'oversight', and fire the finance manager with a nice little package of perks behind the scene to placate his sacrifice 'for the team.' That's how it's done, but what does he do? Comes out in defense of his low payment schedule for his own staff. Asswipes will be asswipes....only he's now dried out, stained and ready to be flushed.

Damn, he makes me so mad.

WHAT A BiG FUCKING SURPRISE !!

Hate him. He’s a gasbag with no second act. Could never understand how people couldn’t see right through him. Good riddance, fake-o.

I wonder what the other candidates pay their salaried staff?

Here you go, Bernie.

Now get out.

"They're actually VOLUNTEERS, so the little they're getting paid is a BONUS! They should be GRATEFUL!"

Fuck off, Boris! We are on to you.

[quote]His Campaign doesn't pay its workers 15$ minimum wage that he preaches

Was this written by a child?

Anyway, this is a huge mistake for Sanders in that image is everything. The first rule of politics is to practice what you preach... with any matter that could or will end up in public, at least. He knew better than this. In fact, I almost thought this was a rumor rather than fact until I looked it up, because it's a really silly thing that Bernie could have scored points with, but instead he shot himself in the foot.

R32, in Russia they put the Ruble sign after the amount, unlike the US.

Bernie has no clue about money, When he and the misses owned a college in Vermont, it went bankrupt.

You mean a lying, hypocrite, scumbag, grifter from 2016 is STILL a lying, hypocrite, scumbag, grifter? I'm shocked. SHOCKED!!!

Didn't the $15 minimum wage just pass the House the other day? Doesn't it still need to go to the Senate...and then onto the White House for signature before it becomes law?

By the way, it will fail in the Senate, or even more likely, McConnell will never bring it to the floor for a vote.

If this is the case, Bernie is not violating any law at the moment.

A big round of applause to R36 for ENTIRELY missing the point of the entire matter.

You are all so gullible. Don't feed the troll!

Do the women make even less than the men?

R37. I did't miss the point. He's following the law.

You missed the point. He can pay any amount over the minimum wage. He just can't go below it. He has been carping about the importance of the $15 an hour wage, but then he fails to pay it to his own staff.

He’s just trying to emulate the democratic socialist Scandinavian nations which in fact have no minimum wage laws. One of many facts that he and his cult followers deliberately fail to mention or are ignorant of.

You don't need to legislate the minimum wage when you have strong unions that are in good relations with the government.

[quote]I did't miss the point.

Yeah, you did. Nobody is accusing Bernie of violating the law. He's being accused of violating his principles. If you run on a platform of a national $15/hour minimum wage but don't choose to pay your own workers that figure, you're going to come in for (justifiable) ridicule and accusations of being a hypocrite.

If I understand this situation correctly, though, it's a bit more nuanced than that. His workers unionized, something he proudly publicized, and they negotiated a contract in which field organizers would be paid a salary of $36,000 rather than an hourly wage. As salaried employees, they are under a different set of rules than are hourly employees. With a 40-hour work week, these field organizers are being paid a bit over $17 an hour. So far, so good.

The problem is that the Sanders campaign is asking them to work 60 hours a week. Since they're salaried, they are not entitled to overtime pay. A $36,000 salary at 60 hours a week has them making under $12 an hour. If these were hourly workers, getting 20 hours of overtime every week, they'd be making over $54,000 a year.

So what the campaign workers are saying is that if you want us to work 60 hours a week, then pay us for 60 hours a week, which doesn't seem like an unreasonable request.

R42, those "democratic socialist Scandinavian nations" have so many other protections and benefits that minimum wage laws are largely unnecessary. Since the U.S. does not have that same level of support, we need the minimum wage laws. And even then, U.S. workers still come up short when measured against other nations.

Personally, I would be delighted to forego minimum wage laws in order to obtain those other benefits.

R45 I’ve lived in Sweden for close to a year and have many Swedish friends here in the US. None of them want to go back, in fact most of them are either citizens or working towards citizenship. You want to pay 80% taxes or close to it and have VAT that are regressive to working class, then go ahead and try immigrating there. I’m not even saying the system there is bad, it works for small populations that are fairly of similar race/ cultures and share liberal values. It would not work when they start accommodating people from regressive, sexist, homophobic cultures. Just my two cents

*shrug* That doesn't change my point, R46. Moving the goalposts doesn't really help your argument, not to mention that your personal experience doesn't match up with what the polling data show. Those in the Scandinavian countries generally rank at or near the top when it comes to satisfaction and happiness, much higher than those in the U.S.

As for "regressive" taxes, I doubt you really want to go there in a comparison between the U.S. and Sweden, and even less so when you consider the benefits those "working class" people get, benefits that are denied the U.S. workers. They pay more in Sweden but they get a lot more.

None of this, of course, has anything to do with this particular story.

Wow, that's dismissive, r47. Who elected you the thread police?

I must have missed my own post where I acted as "the thread police," r48. By all means, do let me know where I told someone what they could and could not post.

Free clue: that simple statement of fact in my last sentence in r47 ain't it.

Free clue: you're an asshole, r49.

R36

Law ? No. BERNIE is just another hypocrite. If he truly believed in the $ 15. an hr minimum THEN he should be doing something for those who currently work for him to compensate in the meantime.

Free clue: you're on Datalounge, R50.

I'd like to hear more from the Swede considering he's right about people leaving.

It doesn't appear to have changed much in the past ten years, R53.

Immigration into the country is double the emigration from.

When over 50k people in a country with a population of about 10m leave a year, it's something, r54. When close to 600k leave in 10 years, its something. When your growth is all immigration into the country, it's something, r54.

Not necessarily, R56. How many of the latter group are also in the former group, i.e., how many people leaving were once immigrants but have decided not to stay? And how does this compare to there European countries and to other industrialized nations? Absent additional data, neither of those graphs indicate a problem.

It looks from the numbers like Sweden is continuing to grow at the rate of about 30,000 a year, absent emigration and immigration, so essentially a stable population with a small growth rate. You're going to have to work a lot harder to pretend the sky is falling there.

bump

From CNN just a few hours ago.

God, Bernie is obnoxious. If his staffers are at the point where they're airing their frustrations, it's pretty bad. He wants to muzzle them so people don't know he's a hypocrite. I really hope Pete or Liz throw this at him in case he starts rambling about a basic living wage.

I hope Elizabeth Warren flays the flesh from his bones during the debate. I hope they all jump on him and tear him limb from limb during the debate. He’s a do nothing, divisive, demagogue and every minute he’s in the race is time wasted on REAL candidates with REAL policies.

Gawd, Bernie is JUST LIKE every miserable old Jew I've ever met in my life!

He knows absolutely EVERYTHING and his certainty is always delivered harshly and without hope of accommodating any ideas but his own. I can tell people are simpletons RIGHT AWAY when they are impressed with ANYTHING about Bernie Sanders.

Yeah, he needs to get out. He had his "moment" in 2016 and he lost.

No one wants to hear from him now. He's had several years to get stronger, more developed policies and he has failed to do so.

He had a moment in 2016 because he was the only alternative candidate. If you didn't like Hillary, personally, or didn't like her centrism, politically, then Bernie was the only place to demonstrate your opposition to Hillary and to the people controlling the DNC. The two of them occupied completely separate political worlds and each had clear title to their unique constituencies.

Now, with this large field of candidates, Bernie is no longer the only person presenting progressive views. With actual competition, he doesn't stand a hope in hell of advancing. Voters with progressive goals have a variety of candidates to choose from who can reasonably be expected to advance those goals.

Thanks, Bernie, for getting that progressive ball rolling in 2016. Here's your gold watch. Now go home.

Sanders' candidacy was an ego trip for him and a wild fantasy for his supporters. Anti-Jewish bigotry and hatred is far too entrenched in America for the voter to consider for a nanosecond electing a Jew as President. See R62, myriad DL threads, the US media, etc. etc. etc. for examples.

It isn't written 15$ in the US, Svetlana. We say it that way, but we write it differently.

r62 is an anti-Semite.

Shun him gals!

R62 Hi Ilhan!

The only reason he isn't paying them minimum wage is because he'd rather not do so.

WTF kind of union negotiates a collective bargaining agreement for salaried employees, but neglects to put a cap on the number of hours per week and a provision for paying for hours that exceed that cap?

The union negotiated the deal. The employees ratified it. I can't bear Bernie Sanders, but there is no reason for him to go back and open up this agreement. That just isn't done except in the most extraordinary circumstances. Stupidity and neglect are not extraordinary.

Bernie is a hypocrite.

I’ve never understood how anyone can buy into his bullshit. I’m sure while he’s refusing to pay his workers minimum wage both he and his fat wife are using campaign funds to fly first class and dine in four star restaurants.

Bernie's collapse began in 2016 when he lost the Democratic primaries by more than 3 million votes and got pissy, thereby contributing to the ascension of the Orange Turd. Thanks, Bernie.

It has only continued to go downhill since. It appears the only ones who haven't noticed are Bernie and his dwindling band of true believers - who finally figured out they were getting screwed working for him.

The minimum wage is a little deceiving. I know someone who works as a server in a small breakfast restaurant and only gets paid $6.75/hour. That doesn't include health benefits and only recently was given one week vacation. Restaurants are allowed to subtract tips from the minimum wage.

*misleading is probably a better word than deceiving.