Originally published at http://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/04/28/maybe-pay-people-more-says-aoc-data-shows-half-us-workers-could-make-more
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Big Oil and a number of other Industries were losing money before COVID hit. These same Government officials talking about how enhanced payouts to unemployed workers are not justified as it motivates them to stay home seem to have no issues handing Corporations now made “profitable” via Government dollars so regarding that money to Corporations.Would this not encourage them to lose money? Would this not be an incentive to ensure the pandemic spreads and lingers?
There was also that multi-trillion dollar bailout of Banks some years bank. Did these same guys vote against that? Those same Bankers are going to be around again in short order asking for handouts the difference being while the worker needs that money just to eat and pay rent , that banking class needs it to buy another Yacht or buyback their own stocks so as to fatten their net wealth another few billion dollars.
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A bit off topic but worth the laugh
Here is the Front Page of the Irish Daily Mirror from Saturday
Hilarious!
~https://i.imgur.com/eXafdn4.jpg
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It seems we really need to move to the idea of a universal basic income for sustenance with work being driven by desire for the extras in life. Overtime probably needs to fade away except for in infrequent cases. Quality of life should replace GDP as the “metric” of maximization goal. Those who seek to dumb down the flock so as to shear them should be pilloried for their fellow extortionists to see. Fair incentives should be maintained, but excesses drained.
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The economy is not the stock market, or the bottom lines of a handful of massive corporations. The economy is the nurses, grocery store workers, warehouse and construction workers, and so many other workers and families. And when they aren’t prospering, the economy isn’t strong. We are the economy, and we can join together — whether we are white, black, or brown, whether we were born here or we came here — to take back power from the wealthy and well connected and use it to invest in ourselves, unrig the rules, and include us all in the growth and prosperity that will hope follows.
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$15 an hour for 40= $600 a week. That’s $2,400 a month. Take out taxes and insurance you can’t even pay rent let alone have a good life. Meanwhile Washington is still fighting to keep that from happening. Should we party in the streets if we actually win the fight for $15?? That’s still a poverty wage. If you can afford to pay your workers you don’t get to own a business! Exploited workers unite !!
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Let’s not forget that the wealthy are making off with millions, and obscene theft by people who clearly are not even close to being in financial trouble. Big f***ing deal if people in the low income bracket make a few extra dollars a week for a couple of months.
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If you look where all the Sen. Whiners are from, excluding the usual WSJ Whiners; well ta da, Southern & Red States ( Confederacy of Dunces, Skinflints & Cheapskates R US ) rise to the top. Like pond scum in a swamp. Or, as is the case with the WSJ who can always be counted on, like old scratched records, to consistently repeat, skip and crackle right on cue ( Wimpy Softhanded Jerks, possibly? ).
I’ve got an idea: quit your day jobs Senators, get off your painted hobby horses and join the rat race. Then you’d understand, that because of little princes and princesses like you and yours,
the rats are winning this war on the working poor.
Bring back Eat The Rich bumper stickers.
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I am one of the lucky people with a public pension having worked in municipal government and paid 10% of my family wage into the pension plan during my 15 years of service.
Planning for retirement early this year I concluded that I would be better off getting laid off rather than retiring because collecting UI for the first six months would pay more than my pension. That calculation does not include any of the federal boosters or time extensions that are resulting from the COVID-19 impacts.
So its not just the low wage workers getting screwed.
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I’ve had so many discussions over the years about how labor is undervalued. Even liberals don’t believe me. Its a huge issue. Its like no matter what political stripes a person wears they just accept that labor will earn low wages like its some fact of nature that can’t be changed. No it can be changed! The whole paradigm of “employment” can be changed! The way it is is not the way it has to be.