Senator Bernie Sanders will be introducing a bill today that would require large companies with more than 500 workers to pay their workers at least $15 an hour in order to allow stock buybacks. Sanders has been a vocal critic of unethical business practices and a supporter for raising the minimum wage. The legislation, called The Stop Welfare for Any Large Monopoly Amassing Revenue from Taxpayers Act (Stop Walmart), is co-sponsored by California Representative Ro Khanna and would also require giving workers up to seven days of paid sick leave for themselves or to care for a family member, as well as limiting executive compensation at 150 times the median employee wage. Sanders had proposed a similar bill in September aimed at Amazon; the company then raised the minimum wage for its employees a month later. The new bill is unlikely to gain traction in the Republican Senate, but is seen as a sign of testing the campaign waters for the 2020 presidential election.
See "Bernie Sanders targets Walmart with bill that would prevent stock buybacks unless companies pay workers $15 minimum wagempanies pay workers $15 minimum wage", Karen James Sloan and Ylan Mui, CNBC, November 15, 2018