unions

The sarcasm is pointing out the absurdity of legislating a living wage. The reality of minimum wage laws is it forces all business to an arbitrary lower bound of wages regardless of the other terms of a work contract. Nobody I know who has been working for over a year makes the minimum wage so it's not doing much for any person who's built some skills and experience. What it does do is squeeze small businesses, so Tony's family farm across the street gets in trouble if his family helps out in any official capacity and doesn't meet the minimum wage requirement. It's extra red tape to boost big corporations who love it and squeeze small businesses who get mired in the red tape to accommodate the law. I wish that wasn't the case but it is unfortunately. It's about as silly as a maximum wage.