Your high school part time job is now held by a struggling adult trying to survive and working also a second part time job.  Unemployment rate is high for kids in school and coming out of school.  Keeping wages down is not going to create and keep jobs for them. .The small business will not be around if the community don't have any money to buy it's services. I haven't bought a pizza from a shop in a good decade.  Eating out for us is the dollar menu at McDonald's drive thru window and sharing a large soft drink. 

Here is an example.  My air conditioner needs replaced. They last about 15 years. So 2 years ago I had to have a AC guy out to look at it.  He said it would be $3200 to replace it.  I paid him for his service charge.  He would not even clean it for me.  So my son found a fan motor and rigged it up to work. In the mean time I have been saving for a new one.  It quit last week. 

Let me digress for a minute.

For 6 years the only work my son could get was day labor paid in cash.  He is a skilled finish carpenter and final boat rigger. When the contractor he works for found out that he was going to go to work for USF part time, actually hired him through a staffing services. He was the only day laborer that had a driver license and could drive the truck. He also picks up everyone in the morning. His crew has been in this country for a long time with families but are undocumented. This is common here in South Florida. The contractor he works for is also bail bondsman and a decent guy who pays his people.  Many of them cheat their day workers. So my son and his little crew of 3 men repair stucco on mc mansions. They work for minimum wage on a hard, hot nasty job and the work is not a reliable 40 hour a week.  

Back to the air conditioner.

We went a few days without air conditioning in 83 degree humid weather. I hear the truck pull up and I hear a mix of Spanish and English.  Instead of going home they came to work on the unit.  The car kept leaving going after stuff.  In 2 hours the unit was running again. They cleaned it, recharged it and repaired some wiring. It cost me three six packs of beer. Next month they want to replace the breaker box to it. I suspect when I have enough saved for a unit. It will get bought under someone's contractor license and installed for beer. 

My neighbor 2 doors down is in the same boat but they put in a small window unit for the last year and created a cool room.  They now have enough saved for a large window unit that can be bought at Home Depot. They have at the back of the trailer built a platform to hold the unit where the park manager can't see it. They still have to move the 220 power line. That will get done on a Sunday when no one is looking. They would rather not have to do that and replace the whole house unite that is attached to the floor vents. This unit will cool the whole place and the little unit will go in the kitchen window for cooking heat.

The nice AC technician who is a small business man isn't getting the work because the wages are being held down and labor is not getting paid. There is no path for these men to become citizens. It is a structure put in place by politicians, paid for by the wealthy and it sucks. This is just one example out of millions and millions.

So who do you think has the stump speech that talks directly to me?  When you see polling that shows Clinton is not trusted, it is not because they think she is not truthful, but because they don't trust her to fix the deep problems in the economical structure. 

Besides small businesses can raise prices to help them weather through the transition process of higher minimum wages.  My family will have a little extra to buy one of those pizzas that has a new higher cost, right now I have to make my own. I would love to have a day off from the kitchen. 

When I got married, many moved out of rent as first time home buyers because of subsidize home loans by the Federal government through FHA.  It was called a 216 or 232 loan. The cost of buying a home was cheaper then renting at that time.  Programs like this held the line on high rent costs and speculators in the housing market.  There were other programs also like that.  It helped put my generation in home ownership. 

We need programs for green energy to go along with new higher wages.  Retro fitting current housing stock will hold the cost of household expenses and be good for the environment. Look what Germany has done.  

Some of the most creative and resilient people I know live in public housing.  They are quite good at problem solving. Sanders grew up in rent controlled housing.  He understands the problems that people face in the system. He will work for solutions. 

The best thing about Sanders campaign is, even if he loses, he will go back to congress with his army of supporters and work hard for changes. It isn't all about winning.  It is about making needed changes.