Blog #3: The vote on minimum wage

Posted by Chloë Epstein in English 1 - Dunn - X on Friday, May 30, 2014 at 8:22 am

For my last two blogs, I researched and created my own study on supporting an increase in the minimum wage. Blog #1 was about the supporting/opposing views on minimum wage and Blog #2 was about what average people knew and felt about the minimum wage. Blog #3 is about what I can do to help this cause and actually putting myself out into the world instead of just giving facts and opinions. The way I helped was by spreading information on minimum wage to the citizens of Philadelphia for a vote in May.

I worked at a phone bank with a group called POWER (Philadelphians Organized to Witness, Empower, and Rebuild) where we would call up registered voters and ask them about the upcoming vote on May 20th. We made the calls at Congregation Rodeph Shalom under the leader of Ethel Goldberg and a few other members of the synagogue. Like me, they all really cared about raising the minimum wage and getting people to vote. We worked in a small office where we called people on office phones. Everyone was given a script with three main questions to ask the caller, a voice mail script, and a call list of registered voters. Besides Ethel and me, there were three other women and my dad making calls; I was the only kid. Raising the minimum wage may sound easy because all you have to do is have a majority vote for it. But, it’s actually very hard because 1) Only 48% of Americans actually turn out to vote and 2) For this vote, in order to increase the minimum wage, 70% of Americans would have to support it.

These are some of the other volunteers working at the phone bank.

Ethel Goldberg; the woman who organized this event.

This is the script we used when calling registered voters. It asks three main questions and gives some backup information.

This is the script we used for voice mails.

My dad also came along with me to help out with the phone banking. Here he is calling one of the voters.

This is a picture of the contact list. It featured the person's name, number, e-mail, and address. The other side has check boxes on it so if they talk to us we could give the reason why. There are also check boxes for if they pick up and talk to us so we can find out if they're going to vote on raising the minimum wage or not.

As you can see it is very difficult to change this problem which is why trying to get people’s attention about this cause is so important. Even phone banking is hard because their are many complications with it. For example, sometimes the person didn’t answer their phone, didn’t speak English, had a wrong number, or just refused to talk. You also had to make sure people understood what you were talking about. Many times, when people call about issues, it is confusing and vague so it’s hard to know what you are supporting. Fortunately the script was clear and short. For example, one part of the script explained the issue of minimum wage saying “Did you know that many workers at the airport make $7.25 per hour? This May, we get to vote for thousands of subcontracted city workers like them to get a raise from $7.25 to $10.88 an hour. This will mean a million more dollars in the pockets of working Philadelphia families.” Explanations like these made it easier for people to understand the issues and their stance on them. Making a change can be hard and takes a lot of work, so groups like POWER need all the help they can get.

Even though this process wasn’t easy I did get four people to talk to me, which was pretty successful because they all said they were going to vote and support the minimum wage increase. However, even after making calls, I think there was a lot more I could’ve done to support this cause. I could’ve gotten more involved with other events like this or organizations that were doing similar work. During the phone banking, I sometimes felt like I wasn’t doing the best I could when it came to trying to get people to talk to me. It was hard because it was my first time making calls and I didn’t know how to talk to people who didn’t really care, or didn’t want to talk to me. But, considering all my obstacles, I think I did the best that I could and I’m glad I got involved with an issue like this.

This experience made me realize how important it is to get involved with the community and issues around the world. It’s really hard to make change and a lot people would rather just argue about the problem than actually do something about it. The fact is even though sometimes speeches and debates can help, the best thing to do is take action. It’s helpful to the community and even the whole world and it feels really good afterwards because you’re a part of the fight to make the world a better place.

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