Vice President Joe Biden was speaking as a guest at the Chamber of Commerce Friday morning when he told the group’s leaders that they were “dead wrong” on the minimum wage issue.
“We have a big fight, I know, about the minimum wage. I won’t get into that with y’all here, but I think you are all dead wrong about the minimum wage. That’s a different deal. I got that,” Biden told the audience, which included Chamber President Tom Donohue.
After his speech, Donohue joined Biden on the stage and said, “I want to continue to invite you to come around for the debates we have,” drawing laughter from the audience.
The White House has campaigned for a higher minimum wage, endorsing proposals by Democratic congressional leaders to raise it to $10.10 an hour, up from the current rate of $7.25. The administration argues that an increase would boost the economy by lifting the wages of the poorest people. While the proposal has stalled in Congress, the administration has applied the $10.10 minimum to federal contracting.
The Chamber of Commerce has been one of the main opponents of a higher minimum, arguing that it would hurt businesses, especially small ones, by raising their labor costs as well as hurt low-wage earners by reducing the number of jobs available. A February study by the Congressional Budget Office said a $10.10 minimum wage could reduce the number of jobs by a half-million.
In later remarks, Donohue did not directly respond to the minimum wage comments but said: “Of course, we appreciate the vice president for being here. He is a, ah, fascinating fellow. As a bunch of Irish guys, we get along very well. We fight all the time about issues but on matters of great significance to this country, he is a very serious man. We enjoy having him.”
Biden was the keynote speaker at an event devoted to youth employment the Chamber was co-hosting with the Urban Alliance, a foundation that provides paid internship programs. Biden mostly stuck to the topic, but could not resist the occasional digression.
At one point, the vice president appeared to imply that Republican lawmakers had said that Americans are lazy and do not want to work: “The one thing I do not agree with — as my friends in the Congress and other places suggest — is that the American people don’t work. They didn’t come from the neighborhood I came from. I don’t know anybody who doesn’t want to work [when] given a fair shot.”
Biden also mused on his reputation of being a middle-class guy, claiming that people really mean it as a jab: “I know that I am referred to as ‘Middle Class Joe’ because I talk about the middle class so much — and I know that in this town it is not a compliment. To say you are ‘middle class’ means you are not sophisticated.”
At the beginning of his remarks, Biden joked that he might need a job training program fairly soon himself: “I don’t know what I am going to be doing in two years, but I may be looking for a job.”
Donohue quipped later that the Chamber “would start looking around for him.”
