Robert Reich. (photo: Richard Morgenstein)
orker
pay is rising at the slowest pace ever recorded. But it's worse than
that because the new data include everyone who's paid -- including top
CEOs and Wall Street moguls. The fact is, most people's pay is stagnant
or dropping when adjusted for the costs of living, including rents that
are going through the stratosphere.Conservative Republicans like this. They've long said that Americans are living beyond their means and that the best way to revive the economy is for pay to drop.
That's why they don't want to raise the minimum wage, why they advocate so-called "right-to-work" laws that destroy unions, why they're in favor of outsourcing jobs abroad through "free trade" policies like the Trans Pacific Partnership, and why they're happy for companies to shift from hiring people full time to relying on independent contractors and part-time workers.
But Republicans have it completely backwards. When pay stagnates or declines, people don't have the money to buy beyond necessities -- which causes the economy to slow, as it's been doing (the latest report showed the U.S. economy grew at an annual rate of 2.3 percent in the latest quarter, but the Commerce Department also marked down its growth numbers for prior years). Add to this the record share of workers who don't know how much they'll earn from week to week or even from day to day, because of the increasing reliance on part-time and independent contract work. That uncertainty is also holding back spending, which, in turn, retards the economy.
Repeat after me: Higher wages for middle and low-income workers are good for the economy. Lower wages are bad.
Comments
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Dongi
2015-08-01 18:56
Higher wages means
more purchasing power for labor means higher profits for everyone. Why
do the Republicans have such difficulty in understanding such basic
economic ideas? Have they suffered some kind of abuse from their loved
ones which turns them against common sense? And makes them seek payback?
This is really the essential question. The answer is that Republicans don't have the ideal of equality in society. They are essentially elitist or they support an oligarchy -- a ruling few and a very poor and powerless many. They don't support equality in rights. They hate equality in income.
The Republican Party is essentially the old reactionary movement of the 19th century. They hated the French Revolution and all revolutions because they demanded equality in society.
Republicans oppose laws like "equal pay for equal work"; they oppose labor unions which demand that workers be paid equally; and they oppose equal pay for women. They oppose equal access to healthcare, education, safe environments, and so on.
They really don't care if the GDP falls or the US slips into third world status. That is the price they have to pay in order to have their class-based society or oligarchy.
The real wonder is why any working class American would ever support the Republicans. But we know that answer, too. The Republicans play the politics of hate -- hate Muslims, African Americans, gays, and the rest and vote Republican.
