[updated: correction: it passed the Finance Committee -- not the whole Council]
The City Council Finance Committee has passed the 'Big Box Ordinance' requiring the humungous retail outlets to pay their employees $10 an hour and $3 in benefits.
Boy, what it takes to pay people $10 an hour! You'd think it was the end of the world.
Read the blow-by-blow after the jump...
Chicago Sun-Times:
Daley has challenged aldermen who oppose Wal-Mart's 20-store expansion to describe how they would replace the 8,000 lost jobs.
But the mayor did not flex his legislative muscle to try to stop the big-box ordinance, continuing a hands-off stance to City Council issues that he has maintained in the wake of recent corruption scandals....
Daley's laissez-faire approach left aldermen free to vote their consciences. And they did not hesitate to play to the anti-Wal Mart crowd that packed the City Council chambers....
The vote followed an acrimonious debate that saw organized labor's City Council's allies throw the kitchen sink at Wal-Mart. They talked about a "predatory pricing" scheme that drives smaller competitors out of business and about a retailing behemoth that provides low-paying jobs with meager benefits and faces lawsuits for allegedly forcing hourly workers to work overtime without pay.
Since then, three different ordinances have been introduced aimed at establishing a minimum wage and benefit standard for 'big box' retailers. On Wednesday, the two left standing were merged into one, watered-down one last time and approved over the objections of Ald. Isaac Carothers (29th), who called it a 'rush to judgement'....