The biggest problem is that it’s basically a tax on hiring people with dependents. Welfare program use is linked more to family size than wages. If you make $50K/yr and have eight kids, you’re not making a “living wage”.
I think it’s easy to tell what the extremely powerful incentive is here. Don’t hire people with dependents.
According to Glass Door, Amazon pays $13/hr to its employees. That’s $27K per year, above the poverty line for a family size up to 4. So what Sanders is doing is tell Amazon to definitely not hire anyone who Amazon profiles as likely to have 5 or more dependents. Which is actually pretty doable without running afoul of anti-discrimination laws if you’re slick about it.
What Sanders could actually have focused on was wage theft: Amazon makes its employees wait in line at security to leave, but they punch out before they enter the line. You wouldn’t even need a law, just public pressure on Amazon would probably get them to move that damned time clock to the actual exit.
That’s 1,900 over poverty level. You do know what poverty means, right?
In 1995, I got out of college and got my first full time job, making about $8.80 per hour, which wasn’t awful considering my expenses were 1/2 the rent on a small apartment and all the beer and bourbon I could hold down. Interestingly, $8.80 in 1995 money is about $14.75 today. There is absolutely no way in hell I could have supported a family of four on what I made.
The idea of companies being required to give you enough money to support a non-working wife and two kids is a significant move of the goalposts, and really should be implemented in a policy smarter than suddenly getting mad that some employees need welfare even though they are making only $2/hr under the really ambitious minimum wage many progressives are supporting. Having a policy agenda so unrelated to any kind of stated goal is unlike liberals, who usually pride themselves on their wonkiness, but then again, this idea didn’t originate on the mainstream left. We’re starting to see the same kind of incoherence we saw on the Tea Party right during the Obama years.
I must come down 100% on adaher’s side here. Liberal government policy should encourage employers to hire; instead all too often it discourages hiring.
Linking health insurance to employment is an abomination. Is it wise to create incentives to replace unskilled labor with robots? That’s what much “progressive” policy does.
Let me focus on one specific example which perturbs me. It costs, lets say $8 to pay a human to tally $100 of goods at a supermarket, For $2 the human can be replaced with automated checkout. Now $5 out of every $100 will be stolen by customers … but the supermarket still shows a profit! Better to let the cheats steal $5 of groceries than to spend $6 employing a human. (If the company didn’t need to pay health insurance for that employee, he’d be economical to employ.)
Yes, yes, I understand the history and that American policy can only be changed in tiny increments as long as Stupidism is the dominant political philosophy here. But I do wish “Progressives” would think more … progressively!
There are some ideas out there coming out of the more mainstream part of the Democratic Party that are better:
By contrast, punishing employers for hiring people who need state assistance seems like a convoluted way to go about things at best, at worst it plays into my side’s hands by exploiting public anger at welfare recipients. Sanders is a populist of course, and is under no obligation to either be intelligent, or cooperate with the Democratic Party’s goals.
A “living wage” scales with family size, with no ceiling. $13/h already is a living wage for many people. Hell, $9/h is too. And $25/h isn’t for many people.
It seems strange to make my choosing to have another kid when it would push me into EITC or SNAP territory my employer’s problem.
The bill also applies to part-time workers. So if you don’t have a full-time position available but still hire them part-time (as opposed to not at all), that could really screw you, the employer. Maybe good for the 4 million workers employed part-time for economic reasons. But I don’t see that going well for the 21 million workers who have chosen part-time work.
Yes, I have no doubt Amazon is not meeting all employees’ needs. But I’d rather they take part of the burden of their employees’ often poor family planning choices off of me, the taxpayer, than leave it all on me by not hiring more people in the last couple years than any other company that I’m aware of..
Another problem with the bill: By naming it the BEZOS Act, he’s screaming “Bill of Attainder”.
It does apply to any company with 500 or more employees, so it’s not really targeted just at Amazon.
Except he said in public statements and in the name of the bill that it’s about Amazon. And it’s not even really about Amazon’s pay scales, which are not bad at all and not far from where Sanders wants to set minimum wage. He’s just trying to punish them because he doesn’t like them. A $15/hr minimum wage bill wouldn’t be a problem at all for Amazon, so if he wants to get Amazon it’s not sufficient to just make them pay more.
This one is a minor one, due to it being a kid and Michael Moore corrected him, but still worthy of being included:
David Hogg urged Canadians to donate to Congressional campaigns.
Fair. It’s not a stellar solution.
In that particular case, at least, we do. We’re pushing for healthcare for all.
The one law being pushed by Sanders and Warren does seem to be a bad idea, though. But I do wonder how much of it is real, and how much of it is the idea of picking a radical left idea so that what actually happens is in the middle.
That said, I’m open to the idea that they just didn’t consider the effects at all.
I do like most of your posts in this thread (and is why I stand up for you, even though we disagree), but I don’t think this is worthy of being included.
It wasn’t a stupid liberal idea. It was a single person who didn’t know that something was not allowed. A young conservative activist could easily make the same mistake.
I also actually question the results. Wasn’t one of the things said in the Russian investigation that you can contribute to at least some political causes as long as you are transparent about where the money is coming from?
Or was that just a talking point that was wrong?
Why are you citing a known ultra-right conspiracymonger?
There is an actual video you can watch at your link. Besides the fact that it was painful to watch, he is clearly asking if Canadians can donate, not urging them to do so.
What are you complaining about? Since when did Republicans object to illegal campaign contributions?
The Republican idea thread includes dumb statements, in fact I’d say the majority is just dumb things Republicans say.
Did you watch the video? Here is what he said:
[after someone in the crowd calls out something I couldn’t make out]
“Turn that shame into your vote. If you’re not Canadian” pause
“Um, I think Canadians can donate to political campaigns in the United States” looks at Moore for confirmation, who shakes his head,"They can’t? " Another shake
“Uh, well, well vote here” laughs and shakes head and hand to indicate he is not serious.
“Learn from us. Don’t let this happen here, because we need to come to you guys if we stay on this track.”
So, he momentarily suggested that Canadians could donate, instantly looked to someone more knowledgeable, and immediately took it back. Not showing off a large understanding of campaign finance laws, but then he is a minor who can’t vote yet and has never claimed any expertise in that.
I could see this being stupid if the other liberals on stage had let it slide, but it was corrected instantly.