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The Los Angeles City Council is currently considering whether to raise the minimum wage to $15.25 an hour by 2019. It would follow Seattle and San Francisco, two cities that approved $15 minimum wages in the past year.

The spread of a higher minimum wage is a huge victory for the labor unions backing these measures — but it is unlikely most of the people getting raises will ever be part of organized labor.

The idea of a $15 minimum wage first came to the public's attention in a series of fast-food strikes starting in 2012. Those fry cooks and cashiers didn't just walk off the job by themselves — they were part of a multimillion-dollar effort orchestrated by unions.

But none of those restaurants have unionized, and they probably never will, says David Rolf, a vice president of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU).

"Since at least the early 1980s, winning unions for the first time in the private sector has been a herculean task," Rolf says. "The political process provides an alternative vehicle."

Rusty Hicks is the new head of the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor, which represents over 300 unions. While some union leaders say organizing is dead, he says unions must focus on it. Ben Bergman/Southern California Public Radio/ KPCC hide caption

itoggle caption Ben Bergman/Southern California Public Radio/ KPCC

It was voters who approved San Francisco's $15 minimum wage in November and in SeaTac, Wash., a year earlier, after a campaign led by Rolf.

"We can't be the movement that's just about us," Rolf says. "The labor movement that workers flocked to by the tens of millions in the 1930s wasn't known for negotiating 500-page contracts. They were known for fighting for the eight-hour day, fighting to end child labor."

Rolf is controversial among labor leaders because he's not shy about saying collective bargaining as we know it is dead.

"Any model that shrinks for 50 years in a row in all 50 states is probably not part of the future," he says.

In the mid-20th century, about 1 in 3 American workers belonged to a union. Last year, only about 1 in 10 did, which is the lowest number in nearly a century.

Even so, Rusty Hicks, the new head of the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor, says unions should focus on organizing.

"There is a big debate going on within the broader labor movement about, how do you adapt to a global economy of the 21st century?" Hicks says. "I believe that collective bargaining is not dead."

And Hicks says that while unions may be on their way out in the rest of the country, they're not in LA, where 16 percent of the area's workers are unionized. That number has held steady for more than a decade, which counts as a victory these days.

"LA is on the cutting edge of organizing in this country, from the port drivers, to hotel workers and everything in between," Hicks says.

But it might not be in unions' best interest to be leading the $15 fight, says Nelson Lichtenstein, a labor historian at the University of California, Santa Barbara.

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"In effect, what you have now is the SEIU — its hospital membership ... or its membership working for the department of motor vehicles — [saying that] their dues money is helping to raise the wages of fast food workers, and not their own wages," he says.

This is because most unionized workers earn far more than the minimum wage. According to a report by UCLA's Institute for Research on Labor and Employment, union workers in LA earn an average of more than $27 an hour.

Still, Lichtenstein says, having a higher floor could be beneficial in future contract negotiations.

"If you can raise the wages in those sectors which have been pulling down the general wage level — i.e. fast food or retail, for that matter — then it makes it easier for unions to create a higher standard and [to] then go on and try to get more stuff," he says.

It's also rare now for workers to stay in the same job for their whole career, so people are likely to drift in and out of unions.

For this reason, Robert Matsuda, a studio violinist represented by the American Federation of Musicians, is all for a $15 per hour wage.

"I might have to take a minimum-wage job in the near future, so it might directly affect me," he says.

Even though Matsuda works for well above the minimum wage now, he worries that may not last. He's getting fewer gigs as more film and TV scoring work gets outsourced overseas.

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Taking advantage of new rules issued by the Obama administration, Netflix says it has expanded its service to Cuba.

In a press release, the company said any Cuban with an Internet connection and access to international payment methods would have access to a "curated" selection of movies and TV shows for $7.99 a month.

"We are delighted to finally be able to offer Netflix to the people of Cuba, connecting them with stories they will love from all over the world," Netflix co-founder and CEO Reed Hastings said in a statement. "Cuba has great filmmakers and a robust arts culture and one day we hope to be able to bring their work to our global audience of over 57 million members."

Of course, there are huge hurdles: According to Freedom House, a nonprofit that advocates for the expansion of freedom, only 15 percent of Cubans had access to the Internet in 2012. Not only that, but a Google study found that the Internet in Cuba is the slowest in the Western Hemisphere.

Then there's the price. As Bloomberg notes, "Cubans earn a monthly salary that averages about $20."

Netflix spokeswoman Victoria Ferreira said Cubans who sign up for the service will have access to content that has been made available to other parts of the Spanish-speaking Caribbean.

She said that the Netflix content in Cuba will depend on the company's licensing deals.

"We are not working with the Cuban government on content," she said, adding that "any questions on censorship are speculative and we can't answer them."

All of this comes as the two countries announced plans for a rapprochement. Netflix has become the first major American company to expand its operations to the island since the U.S. loosened some of its restrictions.

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Continued job growth has boosted prospects for the U.S. economy, but it continues to face some tricky crosswinds. The big drop in oil prices and a stronger dollar both help the economy and hurt it. Add to that the recent slowdown in global growth.

Lots of economists have suggested the big drop in oil prices is a gift to consumers that will propel the economy. David Kotok of Cumberland Advisors is one of them. He argues cheaper oil will ultimately be a positive.

"The U.S. comes out a big winner on a falling energy price but it takes time to filter through and into the full economy," Kotok says.

And it starts out as a negative shock to the oil sector. Kotok says cuts in production and energy company payrolls will cost the U.S. economy up to $150 billion. That's made investors nervous. As oil prices fell sharply in January they sent stock markets gyrating.

But as lower energy prices filter through the economy, Kotok says, the positive effects, worth $400 billion, will overwhelm the negative.

Economist Liz Ann Sonders, the chief investment strategist at Charles Schwab, agrees.

"The U.S. economy is 68 percent consumer spending, so right there you know that falling oil prices is a benefit," she says.

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That puts money in consumers' pockets. And low energy prices also benefit many businesses, whose hiring will more than offset the losses in the energy sector. But, Sonders says, the oil and gas layoffs are making headlines.

"The crash in oil prices happened fast and furiously and now we're getting those series of layoffs and rig counts are dropping," Sonders says. "And now people are concerned: Is this going to carry further into the economy, how much of this is a function of weak global growth?"

And, there's good reason to be concerned, says Jeffrey Snider, head of global investment research at Alhambra Partners.

"Whenever you see oil prices collapse, especially by something like 60 percent, something else is going on. And so therefore any benefit that might come to consumers in the form of lower energy prices is being overwhelmed by whatever it is that's causing oil to fall in the first place," Snider says.

And falling oil prices are a clear sign of a dangerously weak global economy, he says.

"You have economies from Europe, Japan, China that are either in or very close to recession or some form of growth that is significantly degraded," Snider says.

And, he says, recent data suggest U.S. consumers are saving most of their windfall from lower energy prices, not spending it to fuel growth.

"And that's an indication of very cautious behavior," he says.

That caution suggests underlying problems in the U.S. economy, including slow wage growth, he says.

Snider says another crosswind is chilling profits for American exporters and multinationals — the strong dollar.

Sonders agrees that earnings at multinationals are being hit, but she argues a strong dollar signals confidence in the U.S. economy that is historically associated with strong growth.

"We're not an export-oriented economy. Most other countries that want to try to lower the value of their currency [do it] because a bigger part of their economy is export-oriented, so they want that weaker currency to boost exports."

In the U.S., exports account for just 13 percent of economic activity.

Sonders says the U.S. is likely to weather the crosswinds in the global economy and experience solid growth in 2015. Kotok goes even further. He says the U.S. will show gradual improvement for the rest of the decade.

"We're gonna do it with a stronger currency, little inflation and low interest rates. It's a pretty picture for the United States." Kotok says.

The strong jobs figures reported on Friday — with more than a million jobs created in the past three months — bolster that optimistic view.

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The documents were downloaded by a former computer security expert at the giant bank HSBC. And they were released over the weekend by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists.

The documents contain records of some 30,000 accounts kept at HSBC's Swiss subsidiary between 2005 and 2007. The accounts contained almost $120 billion and were tied to politicians, royalty, designers and sports figures in every part of the world. They were also tied to corrupt businessmen, dictators, arms industry officials and high-end criminals.

The records show bank employees actively helping customers conceal the accounts from authorities. The bank also provided bundles of cash in various currencies to customers so they couldn't be traced.

The cache of data was illegally downloaded by bank employee Herve Falciani, who later fled to France. Falciani told CBS's 60 Minutes Sunday night that he had help taking the data from other people at the bank.

"Friends, let's say, partners, gave me these data," Falciani says. "I'm not the only person in banking system that wants to raise alarm."

The documents release comes at a time when the secretive Swiss banking industry has been under investigation by the United States and other countries for helping its wealthy clients conceal their assets.

HSBC, which is one of the biggest banks in the world, was fined $1.9 billion by the U.S. government for money laundering in late 2012.

HSBC acknowledged after the documents were made public that its Swiss subsidiary committed wrongdoing. But the bank says it has since reformed its operations and now complies with international banking standards.