On November 30th, there was a small town hall meeting with all of the six candidates in which they discussed their platforms on poverty. They based their comments and opinions on the writings of former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich and Economist John Kenneth Galbraith. Both days of town halls were focused on how education can help solve most of the world’s problems, but, most importantly, Day 1 was a more detailed introduction to each of the candidates to each other.

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The first question that was asked during the first town hall was about minimum wage laws and the changes that each candidate would implement if elected. Since the start of the race, the declared conservatives have been Gersch and Sylvester, with Khan running as a moderate-Republican. Gersch started out by saying that by increasing minimum wages, better salaries would increase competition. During the Republican primary for the 2016 election, an article written by Joshua Ferrer collected the Republican candidates views on raising the minimum finding out that a majority of them oppose any raise. The only Republican candidate who argued for a raise was Ben Carson, and we all know how that turned out for him. If Gersch wants to win the Republican primary, he might have to rethink his plan. For Sylvester, she wants to create minimum wage based on inflation: pushing the minimum wage a bit, but not to the extreme of $15 like in Washington which, in her book, failed. People in Seattle have been losing their jobs, which Katherine believes will not benefit the economy due to possible wage and hour cuts if the minimum wage is raised. Khan’s policies are different from his Republican opponents. He does not want to raise the minimum wage at all. He believes that the more you increase the minimum wage, the more people will start to automate the jobs making businesses not be able to hand out as many jobs.

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The more liberal candidates in this election, Wenick, Herscowitz, and Chaudhri, are more in agreement with the fact that they want to increase the minimum wage. Chaudhri is on one end of the spectrum of definitely raising the minimum wage with no complications in between. He believes that a raise will create more jobs, thus pulling people out of the desperate conditions they were living in prior. On the other side, Herscowitz wants to raise the minimum wage gradually so businesses can adjust to the increase. In this middle, Wenick wants to raise the minimum wage because there are a lot of people suffering with poor conditions of work but is hesitant that raising the wage too much will hurt small businesses: yet another instance of unclarity from the Wenick campaign.

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A week after the first town hall was another mini town hall to prepare for the upcoming debates. This time, focusing on the wealthy with Karl Marx’s The Communist Manifesto and Andrew Carnegie’s The Gospel of Wealth. The primary question, derived from Marx’s work, was how much control should the state have over the economy. Starting with Gersch, he sticks with his idea that leaving the control of the economy to the people and businesses will promote competition. When both come together, the measure of efficient they work, Gersch believes, should be based on merit.

 

Sticking with the Republicans, Khan believes that once the state gives its citizens a couple of rights, anything after that, won’t be considered true equality. After the fact, the government will dictate where the money will go and that’s not what should happen Right as Khan said that, Herscowitz immediately diagreed. She believes that it should be a gradual and slow transition from state to government run. A society should stick with a system and change it gradually instead of an immediate 180. What this conversation brought up was the definitions of and differences between of equality of opportunity and equality of outcome. Khan focuses on the idea that all schools: both upper and lower class, North and West should receive equal spending from the government. But he later says that the amount of taxation and control are inefficient because they are putting in a lot of money but not getting anything out in return, which brings up the conversation of equality of outcome. Sylvester hits on this truth that equality of outcome will never happen. She believes in regulation to the point where monopolies don’t exist. Going to the more liberal side, Chaudhri believes that state shouldn’t be involved in the economy and that there should be regulations to the point where there is no fraud. Chaudhri said success should be based on merit and that people have the opportunity to fraud each other, thus taking the conservative view that competition is a good thing. Wenick continues his campaign by not knowing where to belong, sharing the idea that government should have a role big enough to enforce competition. At the end of his point, Wenick said that he was economically conservative previously explaining that with lower taxes, there will be an opportunity for tax breaks.

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Other than disagreeing on everything, there is one thing that all 6 candidates agree on: an ideal Marxist society will never work in our current government today. Khan believes that a state run economy is too idealistic because the government is more powerful, making businesses not able to do what they want. Chaudhri knows that without individual profit, people will be less motivated to work hard, needing someone in a bigger position to enforce the laws. Wenick believes that money will always end up in the hands of the rich.

One of the biggest things that came from this mini town hall was after Senator Sylvester spoke about the failures of an idealistic Marxist society. Sylvester first brings up the very controversial book Animal Farm by George Orwell. She states that even if we try for a perfect society with equality of outcome, she believes that “it will never happen.” The Senator believes that “the people at the top are always going to take advantage of the people on the bottom.” Sylvester begins that limited regulation of the government will ensure that it is fair and equal, ensuring equality of opportunity. She later goes on the say that equality of opportunity is the best way to get closest to equality of outcome. Conservatives believe in equality of opportunity, but they surely don’t believe in equality of outcome.

Nevertheless, our final town hall, now only weeks away, will be the true testament to whose ideology can be sustained among challenges from other candidates.