1% vs rest of us

Divide by Matt  Taibbi a must read book

newsday letter please read following two articles to understand peace peter

Letter: Raising wages would boost economy Let's connect the dots. "Wage pressure" [News, Aug. 3] described fast-food workers advocating for $15-an-hour wages. Then, Standard & Poor's researchers said that the United States needs to look at the inequality of wealth and pay, because it is holding back the U.S. economy. When the chief executive of McDonald's made $9.5 million last year, and many McDonald's workers earned minimum wage, or about $15,100 a year, that is pay inequality. The same is true in many giant corporations. What the economy needs is more spending. If each worker got $15 an hour -- a wage a person can live on -- he or she would spend it, and the U.S. economy would take off. People earning millions don't spend, but save most of it. The economy doesn't move. Let's give a living wage to all for their work. Peter Barnett, Sayville Editor's note: The writer is a board member of the Long Island Coalition for the Homeless.

S&Preport on why inequality of pay and wealth is hurting the movement of us economy

The Upshot Incomes and Outcomes A New Report Argues Inequality Is Causing Slower Growth. Here’s Why It Matters. AUG. 5, 2014 Continue reading the main story Neil Irwin @Neil_Irwin Continue reading the main story Share This Page email facebook twitter save more Continue reading the main story Is income inequality holding back the United States economy? A new report argues that it is, that an unequal distribution in incomes is making it harder for the nation to recover from the recession and achieve the kind of growth that was commonplace in decades past. The report is interesting not because it offers some novel analytical approach or crunches previously unknown data. Rather, it has to do with who produced it, which says a lot about how the discussion over inequality is evolving. Economists at Standard & Poor’s Ratings Services are the authors of the straightforwardly titled “How Increasing Inequality is Dampening U.S. Economic Growth, and Possible Ways to Change the Tide.” The fact that S.&P., an apolitical organization that aims to produce reliable research for bond investors and others, is raising alarms about the risks that emerge from income inequality is a small but important sign of how a debate that has been largely confined to the academic world and left-of-center political circles is becoming more mainstream. Photo Beth Ann Bovino, the chief U.S. economist at S.&P., spoke at a panel of financial market experts, investors and opinion makers in Washington last year. Credit Greg Gibson/Bipartisan Policy Center “Our review of the data, as well as a wealth of research on this matter, leads us to conclude that the current level of income inequality in the U.S. is dampening G.D.P. growth,” the S.&P. researchers write, “at a time when the world’s biggest economy is struggling to recover from the Great Recession and the government is in need of funds to support an aging population.” To understand why this matters, you have to know a little bit about the many tribes within the world of economics. There are the academic economists who study the forces shaping the modern economy. Their work is rigorous but often obscure. Some of them end up in important policy jobs (See: Bernanke, B.) or write books for a mass audience (Piketty, T.), but many labor in the halls of academia for decades writing carefully vetted articles for academic journals that are rigorous as can be but are read by, to a first approximation, no one. Then there are the economists in what can broadly be called the business forecasting community. They wear nicer suits than the academics, and are better at offering a glib, confident analysis of the latest jobs numbers delivered on CNBC or in front of a room full of executives who are their clients. They work for ratings firms like S.&P., forecasting firms like Macroeconomic Advisers and the economics research departments of all the big banks. The key difference, though, is that rather than trying to produce cutting-edge theory, they are trying to do the practical work of explaining to clients — companies trying to forecast future demand, investors trying to allocate assets — how the economy is likely to evolve. They’re not really driven by ideology, or by models that are rigorous enough in their theoretical underpinnings to pass academic peer review. Rather, their success or failure hinges on whether they’re successful at giving those clients an accurate picture of where the economy is heading. Continue reading the main story Continue reading the main story In that sense, the new S.&P. report is a sign of how worries that income inequality is a factor behind subpar economic growth over the last five years (and really the last 15 years) is going from an idiosyncratic argument made mainly by left-of center economists to something that even the tribe of business forecasters needs to wrestle with. I asked Beth Ann Bovino, the chief U.S. economist at S.&P., why she and her colleagues took on this topic. “We spend a lot of time trying to think about what’s the economic outlook and what to expect ahead,” she said. “What disturbs me about this recovery — which has been the weakest in 50 years — is how feeble it has been, and we’ve been asking what are the reasons behind it.” She added: “One of the reasons that could explain this pace of very slow growth is higher income inequality. And that also might also explain what happened that led up to the great recession.” “From my research and some of the analysis I saw from others, when you have extreme levels of inequality, it can hurt the economy,” she said. Continue reading the main story Recent Comments Casey K. 9 days ago And here's why nothing will be done about it. Greed. 1%/corporations own the political process. Nearly all house and senators are... Peter Wone 9 days ago Like most of Wall street, the author is careful never to think about the real problem, which is that modern economies depend on growth. They... Hughes See All Comments Write a comment Because the affluent tend to save more of what they earn rather than spend it, as more and more of the nation’s income goes to people at the top income brackets, there isn’t enough demand for goods and services to maintain strong growth, and attempts to bridge that gap with debt feed a boom-bust cycle of crises, the report argues. High inequality can feed on itself, as the wealthy use their resources to influence the political system toward policies that help maintain that advantage, like low tax rates on high incomes and low estate taxes, and underinvestment in education and infrastructure. Those ideas go back to John Maynard Keynes, and this year alone major books from academic economists have explored them (Atif Mian and Amir Sufi’s “House of Debt,” and the aforementioned Thomas Piketty’s “Capital in the Twenty-First Century”). The report itself does not break any major new analytical or empirical ground. It spends many pages summarizing the findings of various academic and government economists who have studied inequality and its discontents, and stops short of recommending any radical policy changes favored by the likes of Mr. Piketty (who is among those cited). And the S.&P. researchers are relatively limited in their policy prescriptions, avoiding much discussion of politically explosive debates over marginal tax rates and the scale of the social welfare system. They instead emphasize the usefulness of investing more heavily in education. Ms. Bovino and her colleagues find that if the average amount of education of the nation’s work force were to increase at the same rate it did during the middle of the 20th century, over the next five years annual G.D.P. would be 2.4 percent higher. The S.&P. report is one document from one research group, so one shouldn’t make too much of it. But it is a sign of where things are shifting: Anyone who wants to explain why the United States economy is evolving the way it is needs to at least wrestle with the implications of a more unequal society for the economy as a whole.

why $15 an hour is needed by all on long island

Julia Vasquez with here daughter Samantha Vasquez 2, Julia Vasquez with here daughter Samantha Vasquez 2, both live with Julia's mother in Port Washington on Tuesday, July 1, 2014. Vasquez who earns minimum wage at a fast food business can't afford to live in her own place. (Credit: Uli Seit) Related media A file photo of a person applying for What jobs are growing fastest? NAFTA Where trade deal lost LI over 1,000 jobs Rep. Peter King (R-Seaford) will attend the How LI reps voted on 55 issues jobs numbers See where the jobs are on LI Leslie Moonves $62,157,026 yearly compensation change: -11.1%CEOCBS Corp.1-yr LI executive pay Portion of the salary application Interactive: Compare their pay to yours Travel deals Julia Vasquez of Port Washington knows exactly where she will be each weekday, 52 weeks a year. She rises early, puts on her white shirt and jeans, and by 6:30 a.m. Vasquez is standing behind the counter of a fast-food restaurant in Suffolk County working an eight-hour shift. Her weekly take-home pay for 40 hours: about $300. SEARCH: What different jobs pay | LI vs. NYC salaries | Where are the jobs on LI? | Forecast for jobs | State worker overtime | LI jobs lost because of NAFTA | How LI reps voted on job bills Vasquez, 34, is employed in one of the fastest-growing job categories on Long Island, with among the lowest wages. Her $10-an-hour pay is higher than what many make in similar jobs. "It's very hard to manage, to provide for my daughter and pay my rent," said Vasquez, who has no benefits, paid sick days or vacations. "It's not easy." Now there's a movement nationally and across New York pushing for higher hourly pay for fast-food and other low-wage workers. The effort faces fierce opposition from business associations and small-business owners who say that higher wages could force them to raise prices, cut jobs or even close down. "Honestly, it's very tough to give them any kind of wage increase," said Jeff Iqubal, owner of Dante's Pizzeria of Hicksville. Last weekend, about 1,200 fast-food workers gathered from all over the country at an expo center outside Chicago to strategize on furthering their campaign for $15-an-hour wages, focusing on franchises and chains like McDonald's and Burger King. The Service Employees International Union, with 2 million members, helped underwrite the two-day convention, where there was unanimous support for nonviolent actions of civil disobedience. In June in Albany, about 1,000 workers demonstrated at the state Capitol in favor of a bill to allow localities to set minimum wages higher than the state minimum of $8 an hour (already slated to rise to $9 by the end of 2015.) Fast-food workers, led by unions, especially the SEIU, and other advocacy groups, also have staged one-day strikes and demonstrations, beginning in New York City in November 2012. On May 15, coordinated demonstrations took place in 130 U.S. and 20 foreign cities -- although none on Long Island. Federal legislation in the Senate proposes to raise the $7.25 federal minimum wage to $10.10, but activists support wages as high as $15 an hour, a figure backed by New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio and recently enacted in Seattle, to be phased in by 2021. Fast-food outlets have been difficult to unionize because most are run by individual franchise holders operating under a franchiser corporation's rules. However, on Tuesday, labor won a potentially big victory when the National Labor Relations Board determined that McDonald's, USA, LLC could be named a joint employer of workers in its more than 14,000 U.S. restaurants, the great majority operated by franchisees. The board's Office of the General Counsel found merit in 43 cases so far, alleging labor law violations against workers, including charges they were punished for pro-union activities, and said suits could be filed against McDonald's if the cases aren't settled first. The decision to name McDonald's a joint employer opens the way for a unionization campaign targeting the corporation directly rather than its more than 3,000 individual owner-operators. A McDonald's representative said the company would contest the labor board decision, and said it wasn't responsible for hiring, termination, wages and employee hours at franchised locations, according to The Associated Press. Many support children Minimum-wage workers are typically depicted as young and entry-level, yet federal data reveal that more than 40 percent are 25 and older. About a third of those 20 or older -- such as Vasquez -- support children. To get by, Vasquez, who said she gets no financial help from her child's father, lives with her mother, paying $600 a month in rent, and relies on food stamps and county help to pay for day care for her 2-year-old daughter, Samantha. Still, Vasquez never takes a week off. "I don't have the luxury of taking vacations," she said. "My daughter needs her clothes, her shoes. It's a very tight budget." Last year, 23,532 people worked in Long Island's 2,317 limited-service restaurants, which includes fast-food outlets as well as delis, takeout pizzerias and sandwich shops. That was up from 17,151 employees in 1,675 establishments 10 years earlier, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Business groups, including the National Restaurant Association, have come out strongly against raising the minimum wage, especially as high as $15, arguing it would force business owners to cut jobs and hours and result in a loss of entry-level jobs for young workers. And, critics of raising the minimum wage point out, family incomes may be considerably higher than the earnings of individual fast-food workers, especially for teenagers or young people living with their families, or for married employees. Matthew Haller, spokesman for the Washington, D.C.-based International Franchise Association, which represents about 30,000 individual franchisees with businesses ranging from fast food to print centers and flower shops, said raising the federal minimum wage would force business owners to raise prices -- or eliminate jobs. "A minimum wage was never meant to be a living wage," he said, noting such jobs were traditionally held by young workers or those seeking flexibility, who, in a better job market, could then move on to higher-paying employment. "Part of the reason we're having this conversation" about raising minimum wages, he said, "is because of the lack of job creation in other sectors of the economy." "Fast-food restaurants typically operate on thin profit margins," he said. "A lot of restaurants choose to pay wages that are competitive in the market in which they operate, but raising wages to extreme levels like $15 is unsustainable. At a certain point if you can't turn a profit in a business, you have to go out of business or raise prices, or you eliminate workers, and that impacts consumers." Yet the economic implications are more complicated, suggested John Rizzo, economist at the Long Island Association, a business group based in Melville. He noted that while rapidly rising wages could motivate businesses to raise prices, cut workers' hours and spur automation, there were benefits from raising low incomes as well. Low-wage workers spend their income, and with more money in hand their spending could help boost local economies. "It's a trade-off," he said. While advocates say profitable businesses could pay higher wages, many small-businessmen such as Jeff Iqubal say they cannot. He'd have to cut his two main employees' hours, he said, if wages rose above the $10 an hour he pays now. They each work about 36 hours and hold second jobs elsewhere. In addition, "There's a lot of competition here," said Iqubal, who works 72 hours a week in the strip mall pizzeria he's owned for nine years. "With [owning only] one place, you can't live." Gary Gulla, 57, another independent small-businessman, has owned Bellagio Pizzeria in Farmingdale for the past 14 years. He, his wife and three children run it, with about 33 full- and part-time employees, who make from $8-an-hour minimum wage to as much as $18 an hour for cooks and pizza makers. In a competitive business climate, he said, rising costs, including salaries, mean higher prices for consumers, which could jeopardize jobs and businesses if prices get too high for consumers to accept. "Many business owners are just barely bringing home a paycheck, and raising salaries and prices would put them out of business -- which would raise unemployment," said Richard Albano, 53, owner of Richie's Pizza in Deer Park. His own employees start out at $9 an hour, with good performers moving up to $12 or $13 an hour after two months. A higher minimum wage "won't affect me because we're doing good," he said. Most affected would be franchises with a business model of low wages and thin profit margins, and an owner "who isn't doing that well in a small business," he said. Struggle on Long Island But while business owners must meet their expenses, so too must low-wage workers. And meeting expenses can be especially difficult for low-wage families on high-cost Long Island. A 41-year-old Suffolk County woman whose husband holds a low-wage factory job said her income at a fast-food hamburger franchise helped pay for food and clothing for their three sons. After seven years on the job, she takes home only about $100 for a 15-hour week. "I want to work 40 hours a week here, but the boss says no," said the woman, who asked that her name be withheld. She recently began a second job working three days a week at a clothing store, for about $150 more in take-home pay. "I'm not happy, but God helps me," she said. Ana Davis, 22, a Hofstra University senior from Connecticut, better fits the depiction of a low-wage worker as young and entry-level. Yet, she supports herself on her wages without help from her working mom, and takes out college loans. She pays rent for her off-campus housing in Uniondale by working up to 35 hours a week at the Westbury fast-food restaurant. She makes $9.75 an hour and takes home, after taxes, about $250 to $300 a week, she said. Over the last school year, she said, she had worked three jobs and her grades suffered as she sometimes traded off attending class with the need to work enough to pay her bills. "The money is getting kind of thin," said Davis, noting her pay is "better than a lot of other places, but realistically it doesn't cover everything. Honestly, this is the best job I ever had, but it would be nice to earn enough to be comfortable." Mileny Loais, 23, who makes $8.50 an hour at a sandwich chain franchise in Mineola, lives with her parents in Uniondale. Like many young adults in a difficult job environment, she still lives in her childhood bedroom. She has looked on Craigslist for an apartment but said with a laugh, "No, I couldn't move out. I'll have to stay with my parents for a couple more years." She'd like to save for college, she said, but barely covers her personal expenses. Wages of $10 or $12 an hour, she said, "would be a lot better. That would help me a lot." Organizing workers Make the Road New York is among the advocacy groups organizing low-wage workers. Its Long Island chapter, based in Brentwood, includes volunteers such as Teresa Farfan, 65, of Central Islip, who used to work at a national fast-food chain for up to 70 hours a week with no more than $400 in take-home pay. Another is a pizza deliveryman, 64, who requested anonymity. After 12 years on the job, his 50- to 56-hour workweek at $6.75 an hour plus overtime yielded weekly take-home pay of $150 to $200, plus tips, he said. His tips — from $30 to $100 a week — go to maintain his car, which he must use for deliveries. But for many workers, the fast-food industry, whatever its wages, offers the best job they can find. Vasquez, the single mom from Port Washington, said since beginning work in the fast-food industry 11 years ago, she’s tried to find better-paying jobs. For two years she had a job in a warehouse, which ended when the company moved, and she returned to her fast-food employer. “If I find something better, I leave, and if that doesn’t work out,” she said, “they always take me back.” SURVIVING ON $16,018 A YEAR In 2013, the average wage was $16,018 for limited-service restaurants (including fast-food restaurants, delis, limited-menu pizzerias and other similar establishments). In 2003, the average wage was $13,220. (Average wage is total wages divided by total number of employees, from higher-wage salaried managers to teenage part-timers). Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics The Washington, D.C., think tank Economic Policy Institute’s family budget calculator said an adequate but modest income in 2013 for a family of four on Long Island was $94,567. It posited a monthly budget of $7,881, including $2,000 for child care, $607 for transportation, $1,387 for health care, $754 for food, $1,583 for housing, taxes of $946 and $598 for other necessities. Among workers earning between $7.25 and $11 nationally, the median age is 30 (half older, half younger) and more than a third (34.5 percent) are at least 40 years old. In New York State, low-wage workers provide on average 46.8 percent of family income. Source: Economic Policy Institute analysis of U.S. Community Population Survey data MINIMUM PAY IN STATES As of June 1, 22 states and the District of Columbia have minimum wages above the federal minimum wage. 19 states, Guam, and the Virgin Islands have minimum wages the same as the federal minimum wage of $7.25. Four states, American Samoa and Puerto Rico have minimum wages below the federal minimum wage (the federal minimum thus applies). One state, New Hampshire, repealed its state minimum wage in 2011 but left the reference to the federal minimum wage. Five states have not established a state minimum wage. HIGHEST: District of Columbia, $9.50, going up to $11.50 by July 1, 2016 LOWEST: Georgia and Wyoming, $5.15 NONE: Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina and Tennessee, wages not tied to federal minimum; New Hampshire has no state minimum but wages tied to federal minimum Source: National Conference of State LegislaturesJulia Vasquez with here daughter Samantha Vasquez 2, Julia Vasquez with here daughter Samantha Vasquez 2, both live with Julia's mother in Port Washington on Tuesday, July 1, 2014. Vasquez who earns minimum wage at a fast food business can't afford to live in her own place. (Credit: Uli Seit) Related media A file photo of a person applying for What jobs are growing fastest? NAFTA Where trade deal lost LI over 1,000 jobs Rep. Peter King (R-Seaford) will attend the How LI reps voted on 55 issues jobs numbers See where the jobs are on LI Leslie Moonves $62,157,026 yearly compensation change: -11.1%CEOCBS Corp.1-yr LI executive pay Portion of the salary application Interactive: Compare their pay to yours Travel deals Julia Vasquez of Port Washington knows exactly where she will be each weekday, 52 weeks a year. She rises early, puts on her white shirt and jeans, and by 6:30 a.m. Vasquez is standing behind the counter of a fast-food restaurant in Suffolk County working an eight-hour shift. Her weekly take-home pay for 40 hours: about $300. SEARCH: What different jobs pay | LI vs. NYC salaries | Where are the jobs on LI? | Forecast for jobs | State worker overtime | LI jobs lost because of NAFTA | How LI reps voted on job bills Vasquez, 34, is employed in one of the fastest-growing job categories on Long Island, with among the lowest wages. Her $10-an-hour pay is higher than what many make in similar jobs. "It's very hard to manage, to provide for my daughter and pay my rent," said Vasquez, who has no benefits, paid sick days or vacations. "It's not easy." Now there's a movement nationally and across New York pushing for higher hourly pay for fast-food and other low-wage workers. The effort faces fierce opposition from business associations and small-business owners who say that higher wages could force them to raise prices, cut jobs or even close down. "Honestly, it's very tough to give them any kind of wage increase," said Jeff Iqubal, owner of Dante's Pizzeria of Hicksville. Last weekend, about 1,200 fast-food workers gathered from all over the country at an expo center outside Chicago to strategize on furthering their campaign for $15-an-hour wages, focusing on franchises and chains like McDonald's and Burger King. The Service Employees International Union, with 2 million members, helped underwrite the two-day convention, where there was unanimous support for nonviolent actions of civil disobedience. In June in Albany, about 1,000 workers demonstrated at the state Capitol in favor of a bill to allow localities to set minimum wages higher than the state minimum of $8 an hour (already slated to rise to $9 by the end of 2015.) Fast-food workers, led by unions, especially the SEIU, and other advocacy groups, also have staged one-day strikes and demonstrations, beginning in New York City in November 2012. On May 15, coordinated demonstrations took place in 130 U.S. and 20 foreign cities -- although none on Long Island. Federal legislation in the Senate proposes to raise the $7.25 federal minimum wage to $10.10, but activists support wages as high as $15 an hour, a figure backed by New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio and recently enacted in Seattle, to be phased in by 2021. Fast-food outlets have been difficult to unionize because most are run by individual franchise holders operating under a franchiser corporation's rules. However, on Tuesday, labor won a potentially big victory when the National Labor Relations Board determined that McDonald's, USA, LLC could be named a joint employer of workers in its more than 14,000 U.S. restaurants, the great majority operated by franchisees. The board's Office of the General Counsel found merit in 43 cases so far, alleging labor law violations against workers, including charges they were punished for pro-union activities, and said suits could be filed against McDonald's if the cases aren't settled first. The decision to name McDonald's a joint employer opens the way for a unionization campaign targeting the corporation directly rather than its more than 3,000 individual owner-operators. A McDonald's representative said the company would contest the labor board decision, and said it wasn't responsible for hiring, termination, wages and employee hours at franchised locations, according to The Associated Press. Many support children Minimum-wage workers are typically depicted as young and entry-level, yet federal data reveal that more than 40 percent are 25 and older. About a third of those 20 or older -- such as Vasquez -- support children. To get by, Vasquez, who said she gets no financial help from her child's father, lives with her mother, paying $600 a month in rent, and relies on food stamps and county help to pay for day care for her 2-year-old daughter, Samantha. Still, Vasquez never takes a week off. "I don't have the luxury of taking vacations," she said. "My daughter needs her clothes, her shoes. It's a very tight budget." Last year, 23,532 people worked in Long Island's 2,317 limited-service restaurants, which includes fast-food outlets as well as delis, takeout pizzerias and sandwich shops. That was up from 17,151 employees in 1,675 establishments 10 years earlier, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Business groups, including the National Restaurant Association, have come out strongly against raising the minimum wage, especially as high as $15, arguing it would force business owners to cut jobs and hours and result in a loss of entry-level jobs for young workers. And, critics of raising the minimum wage point out, family incomes may be considerably higher than the earnings of individual fast-food workers, especially for teenagers or young people living with their families, or for married employees. Matthew Haller, spokesman for the Washington, D.C.-based International Franchise Association, which represents about 30,000 individual franchisees with businesses ranging from fast food to print centers and flower shops, said raising the federal minimum wage would force business owners to raise prices -- or eliminate jobs. "A minimum wage was never meant to be a living wage," he said, noting such jobs were traditionally held by young workers or those seeking flexibility, who, in a better job market, could then move on to higher-paying employment. "Part of the reason we're having this conversation" about raising minimum wages, he said, "is because of the lack of job creation in other sectors of the economy." "Fast-food restaurants typically operate on thin profit margins," he said. "A lot of restaurants choose to pay wages that are competitive in the market in which they operate, but raising wages to extreme levels like $15 is unsustainable. At a certain point if you can't turn a profit in a business, you have to go out of business or raise prices, or you eliminate workers, and that impacts consumers." Yet the economic implications are more complicated, suggested John Rizzo, economist at the Long Island Association, a business group based in Melville. He noted that while rapidly rising wages could motivate businesses to raise prices, cut workers' hours and spur automation, there were benefits from raising low incomes as well. Low-wage workers spend their income, and with more money in hand their spending could help boost local economies. "It's a trade-off," he said. While advocates say profitable businesses could pay higher wages, many small-businessmen such as Jeff Iqubal say they cannot. He'd have to cut his two main employees' hours, he said, if wages rose above the $10 an hour he pays now. They each work about 36 hours and hold second jobs elsewhere. In addition, "There's a lot of competition here," said Iqubal, who works 72 hours a week in the strip mall pizzeria he's owned for nine years. "With [owning only] one place, you can't live." Gary Gulla, 57, another independent small-businessman, has owned Bellagio Pizzeria in Farmingdale for the past 14 years. He, his wife and three children run it, with about 33 full- and part-time employees, who make from $8-an-hour minimum wage to as much as $18 an hour for cooks and pizza makers. In a competitive business climate, he said, rising costs, including salaries, mean higher prices for consumers, which could jeopardize jobs and businesses if prices get too high for consumers to accept. "Many business owners are just barely bringing home a paycheck, and raising salaries and prices would put them out of business -- which would raise unemployment," said Richard Albano, 53, owner of Richie's Pizza in Deer Park. His own employees start out at $9 an hour, with good performers moving up to $12 or $13 an hour after two months. A higher minimum wage "won't affect me because we're doing good," he said. Most affected would be franchises with a business model of low wages and thin profit margins, and an owner "who isn't doing that well in a small business," he said. Struggle on Long Island But while business owners must meet their expenses, so too must low-wage workers. And meeting expenses can be especially difficult for low-wage families on high-cost Long Island. A 41-year-old Suffolk County woman whose husband holds a low-wage factory job said her income at a fast-food hamburger franchise helped pay for food and clothing for their three sons. After seven years on the job, she takes home only about $100 for a 15-hour week. "I want to work 40 hours a week here, but the boss says no," said the woman, who asked that her name be withheld. She recently began a second job working three days a week at a clothing store, for about $150 more in take-home pay. "I'm not happy, but God helps me," she said. Ana Davis, 22, a Hofstra University senior from Connecticut, better fits the depiction of a low-wage worker as young and entry-level. Yet, she supports herself on her wages without help from her working mom, and takes out college loans. She pays rent for her off-campus housing in Uniondale by working up to 35 hours a week at the Westbury fast-food restaurant. She makes $9.75 an hour and takes home, after taxes, about $250 to $300 a week, she said. Over the last school year, she said, she had worked three jobs and her grades suffered as she sometimes traded off attending class with the need to work enough to pay her bills. "The money is getting kind of thin," said Davis, noting her pay is "better than a lot of other places, but realistically it doesn't cover everything. Honestly, this is the best job I ever had, but it would be nice to earn enough to be comfortable." Mileny Loais, 23, who makes $8.50 an hour at a sandwich chain franchise in Mineola, lives with her parents in Uniondale. Like many young adults in a difficult job environment, she still lives in her childhood bedroom. She has looked on Craigslist for an apartment but said with a laugh, "No, I couldn't move out. I'll have to stay with my parents for a couple more years." She'd like to save for college, she said, but barely covers her personal expenses. Wages of $10 or $12 an hour, she said, "would be a lot better. That would help me a lot." Organizing workers Make the Road New York is among the advocacy groups organizing low-wage workers. Its Long Island chapter, based in Brentwood, includes volunteers such as Teresa Farfan, 65, of Central Islip, who used to work at a national fast-food chain for up to 70 hours a week with no more than $400 in take-home pay. Another is a pizza deliveryman, 64, who requested anonymity. After 12 years on the job, his 50- to 56-hour workweek at $6.75 an hour plus overtime yielded weekly take-home pay of $150 to $200, plus tips, he said. His tips — from $30 to $100 a week — go to maintain his car, which he must use for deliveries. But for many workers, the fast-food industry, whatever its wages, offers the best job they can find. Vasquez, the single mom from Port Washington, said since beginning work in the fast-food industry 11 years ago, she’s tried to find better-paying jobs. For two years she had a job in a warehouse, which ended when the company moved, and she returned to her fast-food employer. “If I find something better, I leave, and if that doesn’t work out,” she said, “they always take me back.” SURVIVING ON $16,018 A YEAR In 2013, the average wage was $16,018 for limited-service restaurants (including fast-food restaurants, delis, limited-menu pizzerias and other similar establishments). In 2003, the average wage was $13,220. (Average wage is total wages divided by total number of employees, from higher-wage salaried managers to teenage part-timers). Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics The Washington, D.C., think tank Economic Policy Institute’s family budget calculator said an adequate but modest income in 2013 for a family of four on Long Island was $94,567. It posited a monthly budget of $7,881, including $2,000 for child care, $607 for transportation, $1,387 for health care, $754 for food, $1,583 for housing, taxes of $946 and $598 for other necessities. Among workers earning between $7.25 and $11 nationally, the median age is 30 (half older, half younger) and more than a third (34.5 percent) are at least 40 years old. In New York State, low-wage workers provide on average 46.8 percent of family income. Source: Economic Policy Institute analysis of U.S. Community Population Survey data MINIMUM PAY IN STATES As of June 1, 22 states and the District of Columbia have minimum wages above the federal minimum wage. 19 states, Guam, and the Virgin Islands have minimum wages the same as the federal minimum wage of $7.25. Four states, American Samoa and Puerto Rico have minimum wages below the federal minimum wage (the federal minimum thus applies). One state, New Hampshire, repealed its state minimum wage in 2011 but left the reference to the federal minimum wage. Five states have not established a state minimum wage. HIGHEST: District of Columbia, $9.50, going up to $11.50 by July 1, 2016 LOWEST: Georgia and Wyoming, $5.15 NONE: Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina and Tennessee, wages not tied to federal minimum; New Hampshire has no state minimum but wages tied to federal minimum Source: National Conference of State LegislaturesJulia Vasquez with here daughter Samantha Vasquez 2, Julia Vasquez with here daughter Samantha Vasquez 2, both live with Julia's mother in Port Washington on Tuesday, July 1, 2014. Vasquez who earns minimum wage at a fast food business can't afford to live in her own place. (Credit: Uli Seit) Related media A file photo of a person applying for What jobs are growing fastest? NAFTA Where trade deal lost LI over 1,000 jobs Rep. Peter King (R-Seaford) will attend the How LI reps voted on 55 issues jobs numbers See where the jobs are on LI Leslie Moonves $62,157,026 yearly compensation change: -11.1%CEOCBS Corp.1-yr LI executive pay Portion of the salary application Interactive: Compare their pay to yours Travel deals Julia Vasquez of Port Washington knows exactly where she will be each weekday, 52 weeks a year. She rises early, puts on her white shirt and jeans, and by 6:30 a.m. Vasquez is standing behind the counter of a fast-food restaurant in Suffolk County working an eight-hour shift. Her weekly take-home pay for 40 hours: about $300. SEARCH: What different jobs pay | LI vs. NYC salaries | Where are the jobs on LI? | Forecast for jobs | State worker overtime | LI jobs lost because of NAFTA | How LI reps voted on job bills Vasquez, 34, is employed in one of the fastest-growing job categories on Long Island, with among the lowest wages. Her $10-an-hour pay is higher than what many make in similar jobs. "It's very hard to manage, to provide for my daughter and pay my rent," said Vasquez, who has no benefits, paid sick days or vacations. "It's not easy." Now there's a movement nationally and across New York pushing for higher hourly pay for fast-food and other low-wage workers. The effort faces fierce opposition from business associations and small-business owners who say that higher wages could force them to raise prices, cut jobs or even close down. "Honestly, it's very tough to give them any kind of wage increase," said Jeff Iqubal, owner of Dante's Pizzeria of Hicksville. Last weekend, about 1,200 fast-food workers gathered from all over the country at an expo center outside Chicago to strategize on furthering their campaign for $15-an-hour wages, focusing on franchises and chains like McDonald's and Burger King. The Service Employees International Union, with 2 million members, helped underwrite the two-day convention, where there was unanimous support for nonviolent actions of civil disobedience. In June in Albany, about 1,000 workers demonstrated at the state Capitol in favor of a bill to allow localities to set minimum wages higher than the state minimum of $8 an hour (already slated to rise to $9 by the end of 2015.) Fast-food workers, led by unions, especially the SEIU, and other advocacy groups, also have staged one-day strikes and demonstrations, beginning in New York City in November 2012. On May 15, coordinated demonstrations took place in 130 U.S. and 20 foreign cities -- although none on Long Island. Federal legislation in the Senate proposes to raise the $7.25 federal minimum wage to $10.10, but activists support wages as high as $15 an hour, a figure backed by New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio and recently enacted in Seattle, to be phased in by 2021. Fast-food outlets have been difficult to unionize because most are run by individual franchise holders operating under a franchiser corporation's rules. However, on Tuesday, labor won a potentially big victory when the National Labor Relations Board determined that McDonald's, USA, LLC could be named a joint employer of workers in its more than 14,000 U.S. restaurants, the great majority operated by franchisees. The board's Office of the General Counsel found merit in 43 cases so far, alleging labor law violations against workers, including charges they were punished for pro-union activities, and said suits could be filed against McDonald's if the cases aren't settled first. The decision to name McDonald's a joint employer opens the way for a unionization campaign targeting the corporation directly rather than its more than 3,000 individual owner-operators. A McDonald's representative said the company would contest the labor board decision, and said it wasn't responsible for hiring, termination, wages and employee hours at franchised locations, according to The Associated Press. Many support children Minimum-wage workers are typically depicted as young and entry-level, yet federal data reveal that more than 40 percent are 25 and older. About a third of those 20 or older -- such as Vasquez -- support children. To get by, Vasquez, who said she gets no financial help from her child's father, lives with her mother, paying $600 a month in rent, and relies on food stamps and county help to pay for day care for her 2-year-old daughter, Samantha. Still, Vasquez never takes a week off. "I don't have the luxury of taking vacations," she said. "My daughter needs her clothes, her shoes. It's a very tight budget." Last year, 23,532 people worked in Long Island's 2,317 limited-service restaurants, which includes fast-food outlets as well as delis, takeout pizzerias and sandwich shops. That was up from 17,151 employees in 1,675 establishments 10 years earlier, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Business groups, including the National Restaurant Association, have come out strongly against raising the minimum wage, especially as high as $15, arguing it would force business owners to cut jobs and hours and result in a loss of entry-level jobs for young workers. And, critics of raising the minimum wage point out, family incomes may be considerably higher than the earnings of individual fast-food workers, especially for teenagers or young people living with their families, or for married employees. Matthew Haller, spokesman for the Washington, D.C.-based International Franchise Association, which represents about 30,000 individual franchisees with businesses ranging from fast food to print centers and flower shops, said raising the federal minimum wage would force business owners to raise prices -- or eliminate jobs. "A minimum wage was never meant to be a living wage," he said, noting such jobs were traditionally held by young workers or those seeking flexibility, who, in a better job market, could then move on to higher-paying employment. "Part of the reason we're having this conversation" about raising minimum wages, he said, "is because of the lack of job creation in other sectors of the economy." "Fast-food restaurants typically operate on thin profit margins," he said. "A lot of restaurants choose to pay wages that are competitive in the market in which they operate, but raising wages to extreme levels like $15 is unsustainable. At a certain point if you can't turn a profit in a business, you have to go out of business or raise prices, or you eliminate workers, and that impacts consumers." Yet the economic implications are more complicated, suggested John Rizzo, economist at the Long Island Association, a business group based in Melville. He noted that while rapidly rising wages could motivate businesses to raise prices, cut workers' hours and spur automation, there were benefits from raising low incomes as well. Low-wage workers spend their income, and with more money in hand their spending could help boost local economies. "It's a trade-off," he said. While advocates say profitable businesses could pay higher wages, many small-businessmen such as Jeff Iqubal say they cannot. He'd have to cut his two main employees' hours, he said, if wages rose above the $10 an hour he pays now. They each work about 36 hours and hold second jobs elsewhere. In addition, "There's a lot of competition here," said Iqubal, who works 72 hours a week in the strip mall pizzeria he's owned for nine years. "With [owning only] one place, you can't live." Gary Gulla, 57, another independent small-businessman, has owned Bellagio Pizzeria in Farmingdale for the past 14 years. He, his wife and three children run it, with about 33 full- and part-time employees, who make from $8-an-hour minimum wage to as much as $18 an hour for cooks and pizza makers. In a competitive business climate, he said, rising costs, including salaries, mean higher prices for consumers, which could jeopardize jobs and businesses if prices get too high for consumers to accept. "Many business owners are just barely bringing home a paycheck, and raising salaries and prices would put them out of business -- which would raise unemployment," said Richard Albano, 53, owner of Richie's Pizza in Deer Park. His own employees start out at $9 an hour, with good performers moving up to $12 or $13 an hour after two months. A higher minimum wage "won't affect me because we're doing good," he said. Most affected would be franchises with a business model of low wages and thin profit margins, and an owner "who isn't doing that well in a small business," he said. Struggle on Long Island But while business owners must meet their expenses, so too must low-wage workers. And meeting expenses can be especially difficult for low-wage families on high-cost Long Island. A 41-year-old Suffolk County woman whose husband holds a low-wage factory job said her income at a fast-food hamburger franchise helped pay for food and clothing for their three sons. After seven years on the job, she takes home only about $100 for a 15-hour week. "I want to work 40 hours a week here, but the boss says no," said the woman, who asked that her name be withheld. She recently began a second job working three days a week at a clothing store, for about $150 more in take-home pay. "I'm not happy, but God helps me," she said. Ana Davis, 22, a Hofstra University senior from Connecticut, better fits the depiction of a low-wage worker as young and entry-level. Yet, she supports herself on her wages without help from her working mom, and takes out college loans. She pays rent for her off-campus housing in Uniondale by working up to 35 hours a week at the Westbury fast-food restaurant. She makes $9.75 an hour and takes home, after taxes, about $250 to $300 a week, she said. Over the last school year, she said, she had worked three jobs and her grades suffered as she sometimes traded off attending class with the need to work enough to pay her bills. "The money is getting kind of thin," said Davis, noting her pay is "better than a lot of other places, but realistically it doesn't cover everything. Honestly, this is the best job I ever had, but it would be nice to earn enough to be comfortable." Mileny Loais, 23, who makes $8.50 an hour at a sandwich chain franchise in Mineola, lives with her parents in Uniondale. Like many young adults in a difficult job environment, she still lives in her childhood bedroom. She has looked on Craigslist for an apartment but said with a laugh, "No, I couldn't move out. I'll have to stay with my parents for a couple more years." She'd like to save for college, she said, but barely covers her personal expenses. Wages of $10 or $12 an hour, she said, "would be a lot better. That would help me a lot." Organizing workers Make the Road New York is among the advocacy groups organizing low-wage workers. Its Long Island chapter, based in Brentwood, includes volunteers such as Teresa Farfan, 65, of Central Islip, who used to work at a national fast-food chain for up to 70 hours a week with no more than $400 in take-home pay. Another is a pizza deliveryman, 64, who requested anonymity. After 12 years on the job, his 50- to 56-hour workweek at $6.75 an hour plus overtime yielded weekly take-home pay of $150 to $200, plus tips, he said. His tips — from $30 to $100 a week — go to maintain his car, which he must use for deliveries. But for many workers, the fast-food industry, whatever its wages, offers the best job they can find. Vasquez, the single mom from Port Washington, said since beginning work in the fast-food industry 11 years ago, she’s tried to find better-paying jobs. For two years she had a job in a warehouse, which ended when the company moved, and she returned to her fast-food employer. “If I find something better, I leave, and if that doesn’t work out,” she said, “they always take me back.” SURVIVING ON $16,018 A YEAR In 2013, the average wage was $16,018 for limited-service restaurants (including fast-food restaurants, delis, limited-menu pizzerias and other similar establishments). In 2003, the average wage was $13,220. (Average wage is total wages divided by total number of employees, from higher-wage salaried managers to teenage part-timers). Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics The Washington, D.C., think tank Economic Policy Institute’s family budget calculator said an adequate but modest income in 2013 for a family of four on Long Island was $94,567. It posited a monthly budget of $7,881, including $2,000 for child care, $607 for transportation, $1,387 for health care, $754 for food, $1,583 for housing, taxes of $946 and $598 for other necessities. Among workers earning between $7.25 and $11 nationally, the median age is 30 (half older, half younger) and more than a third (34.5 percent) are at least 40 years old. In New York State, low-wage workers provide on average 46.8 percent of family income. Source: Economic Policy Institute analysis of U.S. Community Population Survey data MINIMUM PAY IN STATES As of June 1, 22 states and the District of Columbia have minimum wages above the federal minimum wage. 19 states, Guam, and the Virgin Islands have minimum wages the same as the federal minimum wage of $7.25. Four states, American Samoa and Puerto Rico have minimum wages below the federal minimum wage (the federal minimum thus applies). One state, New Hampshire, repealed its state minimum wage in 2011 but left the reference to the federal minimum wage. Five states have not established a state minimum wage. HIGHEST: District of Columbia, $9.50, going up to $11.50 by July 1, 2016 LOWEST: Georgia and Wyoming, $5.15 NONE: Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina and Tennessee, wages not tied to federal minimum; New Hampshire has no state minimum but wages tied to federal minimum Source: National Conference of State Legislatures

christian first communist second!!!!

Pope Francis just expertly trolled his critics When faced with a McCarthy-esque smear campaign, best to pull a communist switcheroo By Elizabeth Stoker Bruenig | July 4, 2014 107 1.3k 228 Nothing diabolical going on here. Nothing diabolical going on here. (Franco Origlia/Getty Images) Since Pope Francis began speaking in public about the Christian view on economic matters, opponents have engaged in what often feels like a McCarthy-era smear campaign, accusing the Pope of things like Marxism, communism, and Leninism. It was Rush Limbaugh on his radio show that first leveled charges of Marxism after the publication of Pope Francis' apostolic exhortation Evangelii Gaudium; he later doubled down on the accusations: Pope Francis called today for governments to redistribute wealth to the poor in a new spirit of generosity to help curb the economy of exclusion that is taking hold today…That's Marxism, that's socialism. That's not charity. Following suit, an Economist blogger diagnosed Pope Francis' recognition of a link between capitalism and violence as Leninism. "Francis may not be offering all the right answers," the piece opines, dripping with patronizing conceit, "or getting the diagnosis exactly right, but he is asking the right questions. Like a little boy who observes the emperor's nakedness." The pattern is always the same: dismiss Pope Francis, with the greatest respect for his office or the most genteel admiration of his character, by labeling his ministry more political than theological. And the motives attributed to Pope Francis are never neutral; rather, they're mere metonymy, short for larger arguments. Identifying Pope Francis' theological analyses with the boogeymen political ideologies of yesteryear denies, however implicitly, that what he is doing is strictly Christian. This is accomplished by conflating what is religious with what is secular, and in part through selecting ideologies that have been defamed in American culture for their anti-Christian tendencies. It will likely never matter to these critics that Pope Francis himself has emphatically denied any association with Marxism or Marxist ideology. And so in a recent interview, he took another tack: Rather than making another attempt to roundly decry a set of ideologies no one seriously suspects him of adhering to, Pope Francis turned the criticisms around on the critics: "I can only say that the communists have stolen our flag. The flag of the poor is Christian. Poverty is at the center of the Gospel," he said, citing Biblical passages about the need to help the poor, the sick and the needy. "Communists say that all this is communism. Sure, twenty centuries later. So when they speak, one can say to them: 'but then you are Christian'." [Pope Francis, via Reuters] In other words, since his concern for the poor causes critics to accuse him of Marxism, Pope Francis reversed their accusations: rather than Christianity looking suspiciously communist over its concern for the poor, perhaps communism looks suspiciously Christian. After all, justice for the poor is hardly a communist invention; as Pope Francis points out, a focus on helping the poor was native to Christianity long before the 19th century. But Pope Francis' reversal has another effect: namely, it calls into question why our political narratives immediately categorize any demand for justice for the poor as anti-Christian communism. In fact, it would seem rather impossible to practice any legitimate form of Christianity without seeking justice for the poor. If we immediately identify support for impoverished people as evidence of some anti-Christian impulse, then we've built up a political narrative that can't sustain the truth about Christianity. For that reason, Pope Francis' refusal to capitulate to how political types would like to contain the radical power of Christianity is especially valuable, and especially irksome. For as long as he's unwilling to contain his Christianity to the realms it's politically welcome in — say, legislation related to sex and reproduction — it will be too vast and too revolutionary for his critics, who will fail to see it as Christian at all, and will continue bandying about accusations of communism, Marxism, and so forth. But it's hard to imagine those kinds of attacks will ever do much to harm Pope Francis or his message, given that his refusal to pay heed to secular political categories offers a broader range of political thought than his critics' tribal views. Pope Francis puts Christian ethics first, rather than trying to see where Christian ethics will fit in a given political ideology. It's for this reason he can say that communism has stolen the flag of Christianity, and it's his fundamental grounding in faith that will ultimately make his message so powerful Pope Francis just expertly trolled his critics When faced with a McCarthy-esque smear campaign, best to pull a communist switcheroo By Elizabeth Stoker Bruenig | July 4, 2014

College degrees still pay, according to Fed study Originally published: June 24, 2014 10:02 AM Updated: June 24, 2014 9:48 PM By ZACHARY R. DOWDY zachary.dowdy@newsday.com The value of a college degree far outweighs its ever-rising price, and degrees in technical fields such as engineering, computers and math are a considerably better investment, a new study by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York says. The study, "Do the Benefits of College Still Outweigh the Costs?" by economists Jaison R. Abel and Richard Deitz, examines whether the up-front cost of college pays off, even as tuitions spiked and job prospects and wages plummeted in recent years. "While it might seem as if the value of a college degree has declined because of falling wages and rising tuition, we show that this is actually not the case," the authors said. "Instead, after climbing impressively between 1980 and 2000, the return on a college degree has held steady for more than a decade at around 15 percent, easily surpassing the threshold for a sound investment." PHOTOS: Highlights from all local college graduations MORE: U.S. Merchant Marine Academy, Five Towns, Stony Brook, Farmingdale, Briarcliffe, Molloy, Dowling, LIU Post, Adelphi, St. Joseph's and more graduations The Fed study, which looked at data from 1970 through 2013, identified the best degrees for the money, using as a benchmark the 7 percent average return on investments in the stock market. At the upper end, engineering majors realize a 21 percent return on their investment, math and computer majors reap 18 percent returns and business majors cull 17 percent back. Those who major in social sciences, technologies and communications garner 15 percent returns, liberal arts majors 12 percent and leisure and hospitality majors pull 11 percent. Education majors with only a bachelor's degree came in last with 9 percent return, but even that level of performance beat the stock market standard, making it still a good investment, the authors said. The study found that college graduates earn an average of $64,500 yearly, while associate degree holders earn $50,000 and high school graduates earn $41,000. The authors cited another study that showed that people with a college degree earn more than $1 million more in wages over their working careers than those who only have a high school diploma, and associate degree holders earn $325,000 more. "Thus, over the past four decades, those with a bachelor's degree have tended to earn 56 percent more than high school graduates, while those with an associate degree have tended to earn 21 percent more than high school graduates," the study said. Student loans don't offset the benefit, the study said, because the money borrowed is deferred for payment at a later date and the interest is far lower than the return on the investment in an education. Heidi Shierholz, an economist at the Washington-based Economic Policy Institute who has studied wage stagnation, said the Fed study dovetails with others demonstrating the value of a college education. But she added that the wage sluggishness that prompts the dilemma of whether someone should go to college is partly due to declines in union membership. The Fed study did not factor in unionization. Unionized workers tend to earn more through collective bargaining, Shierholz said, and their gains also increase wages and benefits for nonunionized workers. "It's a really significant factor in the stagnating wages for the vast middle of the wage distribution," she said, attributing much of the growing gap between wages earned and the growth in the economy since the 1970s to the loss of union positions. A Pew Research Center analysis cited Bureau of Labor Statistics figures showing that in 2013, 11.3 percent of wage and salary workers belonged to unions, a drop from 20.1 percent in 1983. Happy returns A Federal Reserve Bank of New York study identifies the value of a bachelor's degree by specific fields of study, using as a benchmark the 7 percent average return on investments in the stock market. The study examined data from 1970 to 2013. Source: Federal Reserve Bank of New York

why we need a good immigration program

Navarrette: Americans are confused about 'border kids' Originally published: June 18, 2014 12:16 PM Updated: June 18, 2014 2:30 PM By RUBEN NAVARRETTE JR., The Washington Post Children participate in a U.S. citizenship ceremony at Children participate in a U.n Americans are trying to get a handle on the border kids -- and what President Obama has called an "urgent humanitarian situation" along the U.S.-Mexico border. Americans want to know why, according to U.S. immigration officials, more than 47,000 young people -- most of them from Central America -- have streamed across the U.S.-Mexico border in the last eight months. They want to know who or what is to blame for the surge, and thus should be held accountable. They want to know how federal immigration agents, who are overwhelmed despite being warned by Texas officials two years ago about an uptick in unaccompanied minors crossing the border from countries other than Mexico, are going to respond. And finally, they want to know -- if most of these young newcomers are allowed to stay -- what impact they are going to have on our communities, our politics and our national fabric. According to U.S. immigration officials, almost three-fourths of these minors are coming from Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador. About 70 percent of them have come through Texas' Rio Grande Valley, which is a favorite doorway for smugglers because there is easy access to interstate highways and not much fencing compared to what you find in California, Arizona and West Texas And since most of these young people hail from countries battered by gang violence after the dissolving of a truce, it's more accurate to call them refugees than immigrants. According to the U.N. high commissioner for refugees, the United States isn't alone. Mexico, Costa Rica, Panama, Nicaragua and Belize are experiencing surges in unaccompanied minors. Those who headed all the way to the United States -- often by stowing away on top of dangerous trains that go from the Mexico-Guatemala border to the U.S.-Mexico border -- intended to reunite with family members here. Some have been able to do that and now find themselves as far away as New York or Washington state. The rest are being held in government-run detention facilities or on military bases. Judging from what I've heard in the last couple of weeks, Americans might be able to better understand this story if not for five things that keep getting in the way. -- Even though these kids could be deserving of refugee status, we're projecting onto this story our feelings about immigrants as if these young people were coming here for jobs. For conservatives, that means assuming that every person who comes from Latin America arrives with an outstretched palm for handouts, freebies and giveaways. For liberals, it means using the sad plight of these young people to argue that we need immigration reform because the system is broken. -- We're mixing terms and confusing "amnesty" (the granting of legal status en masse to millions of illegal immigrants) with "protective status" (which merely allows the undocumented to remain in the United States without being deported). While the legislative branch has to grant the former, the executive branch has the power to provide the latter. So it's not truthful or fair for conservatives to claim that young people are being lured here because President Obama is offering "amnesty." -- We're susceptible to believing that the Obama administration is offering some kind of special accommodation in this case because most of us are not aware that there is a long-standing policy of treating unaccompanied minors who cross the border differently from adults, which could include allowing them to remain in the United States in the care of relatives while they await a hearing before an immigration judge for which most of them will never show up. -- We think this is happening because of either a push or a pull, when it's probably both. The kids could have been pushed out by government instability and gang violence in Central America. They could also have been, according to a border security specialist I spoke to with knowledge of what many kids are telling federal officials, pulled to the United States by a rumor spread by television networks in their home countries that Congress had approved a special "permiso" (permission to stay) for children. The desperate will believe anything. -- Finally, we look for one-size-fits-all answers. There aren't any. There are thousands of kids coming from a handful of countries. Each story is unique. Human nature is complicated, and so is this crisis. Americans are no closer to understanding what drives the story of the border kids. To get there, we'll need to keep our prejudices in check and our minds open. Ruben Navarrette's email address is ruben@rubennavarrette.com.