Over the last two years a very exciting campaign 
has unfolded in Silicon Valley, led by students at San Jose State University pushing to raise the minimum wage to $10 an hour. They encountered stiff resistance from the usual suspects–Chamber of Commerce and the like–but on election day voters overwhelmingly approved the increase.
I wrote about the campaign for The Nation, below:
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The Nation, December 17, 2012 issue
In the spring of 2011, students in a sociology class at San Jose State University got together to brainstorm ways to make the world a better place. The course they were taking, Social Action, focused on theory and history while also encouraging students to “apply social change to the local community.” For Marisela Castro, a junior, the promise of action was precisely what she was looking for, and she already knew the issue she’d champion. She was on a mission to raise the minimum wage.
Gabriel Thompson 