Thursday, May 29, 2014
The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com
Michigan law raises minimum wage to $9.25
Thursday, May 29, 2014
The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com
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The republican-dominated
ar through Raise Michigan legislature intended
for the bill to undermine the
chigan campaign Raise Michigan campaign, a civil
rights group that aims to increase
By MARGO LEVY the minimum wage to $10.10 by
For the Daily 2017. The coalition planned to
submit a petition with more than
ny Michigan minimum 300,000 signatures to the Secre-
workers can expect to see tary of State Wednesday after-
r paychecks over the next noon to call for a ballot initiative
ars. in the November elections.
er the House Government Although the new law allows
tions Committee approved a lower minimum wage than
titute bill allowing a gradu- what national Democrats have
rease to the state minimum been promoting, as when Presi-
from $7.40 per hour to dent Barack Obama visited the
per hour earlier in the day, University this April, many
nor Rick Snyder signed the Michigan legislators responded
:isan bill into law Tuesday positively to the new bill.
ng. The original Senate Bill Democratic gubernatorial
ould have raised the mini- candidate Mark Schauer voiced
wage by a smaller margin. his approval at the substitute bill
2018, the minimum wage in a press release last November.
egin to index for inflation. In the press release, he said he
means as goods and servic- would like to see the minimum
rease in price over time, the wage raised to $9.25 per hour,
nated $9.25 will increase as with index for inflation.
ensuring the wage can con- Many Democrats were pleased
to provide workers with a with the Wednesday approval of
e income. Five other states, their minimum wage proposal,
ing Colorado and Wash- despite the bill falling short of
n, apply inflation indexing the $10.10 goal.
e minimum wage - a prac- "I wish we could have had
$10.10 ... but it was a significant
step forward, and it eliminates
leaving this issue up to chance
at the polls in November," State
Rep. Adam Zemke (D- Ann
Arbor) said.
Zemke said some legislators
are reluctant about raising the
minimum wage for they believe it
will eliminate job opportunities.
When the Obama administration
originally proposed an increase
to $10.10, the Professional Bud-
get Office estimated how many
jobs would be lost with the
hired numbers. They found that
150,000 people would lose their
jobs, but 700,000 people would
be pulled out of poverty. As the
passed bill was lower than $10.10,
both numbers would be lower,
but the ratio would remain about
the same.
The economic definition of
poverty is based on those who
receive public assistance, which
takes an economic toll on a state's
budget.
"If you are significantly reduc-
ing the amount of people on pub-
lic assistance ... that's huge for
not only for the quality of life
improvement for (those people),
it is also a significant decrease
of a burden on the state," Zemke
said.
Public Policy Prof. Sandra
Danziger said she was also
pleased with the new increase,
but hopes for a higher minimum
wage in the future.
"The Michigan minimum
wage increase will help many
people and is an important step,"
Danziger said. "It is less than the
federal call for $10.10 per hour
and far less than a living wage.
And, it continues to treat tipped
workers unequally. Low wage
work without either benefits or
opportunities to move up creates
long term economic insecurity."
On the contrary, Econom-
ics and Public Policy Prof. Alan
Deardorff said a significant
increase in minimum wage will
harm the national economy and
boost unemployment. How-
ever, because the number has
remained relatively low over the
past few years, he does not see
this increase as a threat.
"I'm not a big fan of the mini-
mum wage, since if it is set too
high, I do believe it will cause
more harm through unem-
ployment than benefit through
increased wages of those who
remain employed," Deardorff
said. "But the current minimum
wage in the US is low enough that
I don't think that is a big concern,
and since it hasn't risen for many
years, it needs to be increased."
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The walk off
ALLAHASSEE, Fla. - By
the time Florida State
rushed
the field to MAX
celebrate its BULTMAN
Women's Col-
lege World On Softaboll
Series berth,
there was nothing more Michigan
could do.
Courtney Senas, the Seminoles'
lightning-rod center fielder from
Wahiawa, Hawaii, hit a two-run
walk-off home run, and there was
no bringing it back. Michigan
coach Carol Hutchins always asks
her team to keep fighting, but now
there were no more battles to fight.
All that was left for the Wolver-
ines to do was watch Senas leap in
the air before touching first, then
see her move into a dead sprint
toward home, then try to collect
themselves walking off the field
for the toughest moments in all of
sports.
When a season ends, inevitably,
so does a career, or two, or six.
For outfielders Lyndsay Doyle
and Nicole Sappingfield, Senas'
home run meant they would never
again start the game in the out-
field, where they've played togeth-
er for their entire careers.
For designated player Taylor
Hasselbach, no more home runs
that make everyone in the stadium
wonder how she didn't play more
often early in her career.
For first baseman Caitlin
Blanchard, she was now just
an alumnus of the program she
has followed since long before
Hutchins invited her to be a part
of it. To Brandi Virgil, the two-
run shot meant her days pinch-
running were done, and for Katie
Luetkens, it was time to christen a
new leader of The Bench Mob.
Looking back, Hasselbach had
her chances with the bases loaded.
Virgil could have been called safe
instead of out on atag at home in
the fifth inning, and Blanchard
was stuck watching from third in
the seventh.
But that wasn't important once
reality sunk in. Hutchins said she
was proud of her team's heart, and
from a coach like her, she meant it.
No one outside the program
knows what Hutchins said in the
huddle she called while the Semi-
noles jumped up and down around
home plate, then rolled around on
the infield dirt, then ran around
Michigan won game one of the Super Regional and went down to the wire in game three, but lost on a walk-off home run.
EDITORIAL STAFF
Stephanie Shenauda
sshenoudOictigandailo.,,,a
Managing Editor
screaming and hugging. But
you can bet it involved the word
"pride."
After all, they had done every-
thing she's preached since day one.
They played the game pitch by
pitch, like Hasselbach and Doyle
did last week with their unthink-
able plays to beat Arizona State.
They did their part, like Virgil
when she came into nearly every
game to pinch run, then left each
one without protest. Sapping-
field played through the flu in
100-degree weather.
It was understandable, then, for
Hutchins to get a little choked up
when asked to reflect on her senior
group.
"It's tough," Hutchins said. "It's
tough to say goodbye."
The Wolverines have plenty of
returning talent, and even more
in the incoming recruiting class.
They could very well make anoth-
er run next year behind sopho-
more shortstop Sierra Romero and
the same pitching staff of juniors
Haylie Wagner and Sara Driesenga
and freshman Megan Betsa.
But right now, it's hard to
imagine any of that without Sap-
pingfield, Doyle, Blanchard, Has-
selbach, Virgil or Luetkens.
In college sports, it's still about
winning with the people you want
to win with.
This team wanted to win
together, and it could have won
together. That's why it hurt so bad
when there was nothing left it
could do.
* * 2 5 fl UWhite and male, Google
releases diversity data
Females, Blacks
and Latinos are a
minority in Google
engineering sector
SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) - In
a groundbreaking disclosure,
Google revealed how very white
and male its workforce is - just
2 percent of its Googlers are
black, 3 percent are Hispanic,
and 30 percent are women.
The search giant said Wednes-
day that the transparency about
its workforce - the first disclo-
sure of its kind in the largely
white, male tech sector - is an
important step toward change.
"Simply put, Google is not
where we want to be when it
comes to diversity," Google Inc.
senior vice president Laszlo
Bock wrote in a blog.
The numbers were compiled
as part of a report that major
U.S. employers must file with
the Equal Employment Oppor-
tunity Commission. Companies
are not required to make the
information public.
The gender divide is based
on the roughly 44,000 people
Google employed throughout
the world at the start of this year.
The company didn't factor about
4,000 workers at its Motorola
Mobility division, which is being
sold to China's Lenovo Group
for $2.9 billion. The racial data
is limited to Google's roughly
26,600 workers in the U.S as of
August 2013.
ShohamGeva Managing NewsEditor
newsmiihtgwdily.com,
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AaricaaMarsh Editorial Page Editor
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FSU eliminates Michigan
By JAKE LOURIM nity of the day when sophomore leader in slugging percentage. But
ManagingSportsEditor shortstop Sierra Romero walked O'Brien popped up the first pitch
on four pitches, senior first base- in foul territory for Michigan third
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. - Almost man Caitlin Blanchard singled to baseman Lindsay Montemarano.
three games and 20 innings had the warning track in center field The rally nearly ended there,
boiled down to this: the Michigan and a popup from sophomore out- but with two outs and a runner on
softball team and Florida State, tied fielder Sierra Lawrence dropped in first, Senas poked a popup halfway
at two, in a Super Regional final, shallow left field. In a tie game, the down the first-base line. Junior
with both teams' stars coming up Seminoles had to fight out of that left-hander Haylie Wagner ran
in the seventh. jam before they walked off. over to grab it, but she missed it
But when both walked on nine "I walked out to the group and and it rolled toward the dugout.
total pitches, it was up to the rest of (said) it's very doable," said Florida Florida State second baseman Tif-
their respective teams to come up State coach Lonni Alameda. "We fani Brown came around to score
with the hit that earned a berth to practice that a ton. We put pitchers from first, tyingthe game.
the Women's College World Series. out there a lot with no outs early in The Wolverines had another
And that hit came from Florida the fall. ... They had a calm confi- chance in the sixth, when they put
State center fielder Courtney Senas dence about them." runners on second and third with
As the Wolverines loaded the But with the heart of the lineup two outs. Sappingfield blistered
bases with no outs in the top half, out of commission, the Wolverines a line drive right at Florida State
it was only fitting that nearby couldn't make anything of it. After third baseman Briana Hamilton for
lights went off in the middle of the senior designated player Taylor the third out.
inning, shifting the spotlight onto Hasselbach struck out looking, the In all, each team had only one
the winner-take-all game. Seminoles induced two ground 1-2-3 inning. Michigan left 12 run-
But after Florida State got out of balls, the first of which they sent ners on base. A couple fewer, and
that jam, Senas' walk-off two-run home for the force. the game mighthave been different.
home run ended Michigan's season In the Seminoles' half, No. 9 hit- "Ithought we played with heart,"
with a 4-2 loss. ter Alex Kossoff led off with a sin- Hutchins said. "We definitely didn't
Michigan got its best opportu- gle to bring up O'Brien, the nation's give up. We didn'tquit."
4*