Empower Wisconsin  | May 13, 2022

File this in the ain’t it rich category. The Democratic Party of Wisconsin’s unionized Field Organizing team walked out of a virtual all-staff meeting — protesting party management’s unwillingness to meet wage increase demands, the liberal Cap Times reports.

DPW’s represented employees complain a wage offer of $16.12 an hour isn’t keeping up with soaring inflation. Historically high inflation, of course, thanks in large part to Democrats in charge of Congress and the White House.

According to the Cap Times, the DPW and the 29 employees represented by the Campaign Workers Guild have been bogged down in contract negotiations for five months. The old contract expired at the end of 2021. The unionized workers make up less than a third of DPW’s 100-plus staffers, the newspaper reported.

DPW Executive Director Devin Remiker told the publication the party “believes unions play a key role in our country and strengthen the rights and representation of all workers.” The party just isn’t willing to shell out another 88 cents an hour.

The employees get a pretty sweet bennies package. But they want more — as in money.

“According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics’ CPI Inflation Calculator, $15.36 in August of 2020 — when our CBA was originally ratified — has the same buying power as $16.99 in March of 2022,” the DPW employees said in a letter obtained by the Cap Times. “Thus, we are proposing an increased hourly wage to $17/hr to keep up with the two years of inflation since we first signed our contract in 2020 and to be fairly compensated for our work.”

Perhaps the bigger problem is the party they’re working for.

The Consumer Price Index rose 8.3 percent in April — a 40-year high. The Producer Price Index — a gauge of wholesale costs that ultimately hits consumers — soared by 11 percent on the year in April. Real wage growth is far from keeping pace.

“As a direct consequence of President Joe Biden’s reckless economic policies, Americans are still facing overstretched budgets and lower real wages,” Fox Business reported this week.

From extreme, anti-fossil fuel policy to a ponderous response to crippling supply-chain shortages and drunken federal spending, the president and Democrats in congress have pounded the consumer and the economy.

And it’s tough all over, including Democratic Party of Wisconsin staffers.