Socialists Push For $20 Minimum Wage But Won't Pay Workers That Much

Or, how to prove your beliefs don't work in the real world.

The Freedom Socialist Party wants the minimum wage to be $20 an hour. However, they don't feel compelled to compensate their own workers with that kind of cash.

The party is looking for a web developer, and posted a job listing on Craigslist a week ago and Indeed.com yesterday, and it's been raising eyebrows on social media.

Although the average annual salary of a web developer in the U.S. is around $62,500, the Freedom Socialist Party only wants to pay $13 an hour, which would be $26,000 a year. Except that the party won't hire someone full-time, so their next web developer's total compensation won't even be that modest chunk of change. Perhaps they're just trying to protect their employees from the temptations of "capitalist greed."

In case it vanishes or gets amended, the entire listing is below:

According to the party's last presidential platform, these self-described Marxists want:

"jobs program at union wages with childcare available"

"no cuts to Social Security, Medicaid or Medicare. Raise the minimum wage to $20 an hour. Provide a guaranteed annual income. Free medical care for all, including reproductive services and abortion."

Reason contacted the party and confirmed that the listing is legitimate, and that in spite of the party's commitment to unionizing laborers, the available position is not a union job. Don't count on any of those other sweet benefits either, part-timer.

The Freedom Socialist Party applauded the push for a $15 minimum wage in Seattle earlier this year, stating that the city is unlivable otherwise, "compromise destroys solidarity," that the party must "leave no one behind."

One could argue that it's not fair to pick on small organizations like the Freedom Socialist Party, because they can't afford high-pay web developers. Given the requirements they list, chances are they're looking for a high school or college student who is just starting out in the field. But, these are exact reasons why people argue against artificially high minimum wages. It's not "capitalist greed," but an understanding that it puts a barrier between small organizations with limited funding and low-skill workers who want to earn experience.