New in PJ Media:
One thing you can be sure of about socialists: they never learn the lessons of basic economics or of history. And so on Monday, America’s senior socialist scold, 81-year-old Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.SSR), seized the opportunity of Labor Day to make a proposal that, if implemented, would throw millions of Americans out of work and send untold numbers into abject poverty. Hey, that’s what socialists do.
Sanders took to the pages of the UK’s socialist flagship, The Guardian, to proclaim that “Never before in American history have so few owned so much and has there been so much income and wealth inequality.” Bernie’s solution to this rampant greed was simple: force the avaricious plutocrats to fork over some of their ill-gotten wealth in the form of more leisure time for Americans, with no loss of income. “It’s time for a 32-hour work week with no loss in pay,” proclaimed Sanders. “It’s time that working families were able to take advantage of the increased productivity that new technologies provide so that they can enjoy more leisure time, family time, educational and cultural opportunities — and less stress.” That’s great in theory. As always with socialism, reality would be quite different.
Sanders’ picture of greedy capitalists exploiting disadvantaged American workers is enormously tendentious. He shows no awareness of the fact that there are huge numbers of American businesses that are not raking in massive profits on the backs of their put-upon employees, but are barely getting by amid an enormous tax bite, forests of regulations, and a post-COVID non-participatory workforce that can still enjoy a comfortable living at the expense of those who have gone back to work.
One of the many basic lessons of economics that eludes Sanders is the fact that when business expenses rise, it is generally the employees who suffer. Bernie’s 32-hour work week won’t penalize the corporate billionaires of Big Tech or other massive conglomerates; it will penalize the workers who get laid off so that cash-strapped small and medium-sized businesses can meet rising costs. If employers have to pay their employees for a 40-hour work week but only get thirty-two hours of work, considerable numbers of people are going to find themselves out of jobs.
Other businesses, particularly small businesses, will simply go under, unable to cope with the increased expenses. Thus the cumulative effect of Sanders’ recommendation, if implemented, will be to concentrate wealth further in the hands of those large, greedy corporations that he so despises. They’ll be able to absorb the new expense and pass it on deftly to the consumers, resulting in large-scale price hikes, and they won’t be in any danger of economic ruin. Only those who are much closer to the edge will face that ruin.
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David M says
Bernie is a typical globalist/communist. He wants the hoi polloi to ” you will eat ze bugs” & have nothing & like it, while he lives a millionaires lifestyle. They’re all the same, John Kerry travels the world in a private jet while he lectures us to cut greenhouse gases.
Ted Knight summed it up in Caddyshack when he told Spalding he will get nothing & like it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FuNJq_wI1ns
Crudader says
Bernie is a glonistst mother f——sold man is life is all moist over so he f it up for the rest off us 32hours a week is great if your on a £2000 bucks a house wage not so much if your a ten bucks and your rent is £600 do the maths scumbag
࿗Infidel࿘ says
Bernie
Your ilk pretty much destroyed their support once they made race the cornerstone of what defines privilege. When it was about wealth, regardless of whether it was justified or not, you at least had parts of the White working class w/ you. Once Corporate America stepped in & signed off on the social aspects of your program while rejecting the economic aspects, White and “White-adjacent” working class people had nowhere to go but the GOP. It’s that movement that has seen the emergence of not just Trump, but also others like Josh Hawley, JD Vance and Vivek Ramaswamy
mike says
instead of addressing the 1871 take over of the USA making it a corporation and everyone subjects of that corporation
nope don’t address the under laying cause
and laws created by the criminals in government
Westman says
This surely sounds like the beginning of, “They pretend to pay us, and we pretend to work.”
Why do liberals try to recycle ideas that consistently fail because they deny the basic unsupressible human drive of competition?
Progressive liberals seems to be those chosen last at basketball, bewildered by the existence of highly-paid professional sports, believe their existence is adequate reason to be supported by others, and/or, are on a crusade to eliminate human competition through forced equity.
Jerome from Layton says
deja vu all over again. Thus spake Babe Ruth; was he ever right.
somehistory says
I think it was Yogi Berra who was reported to have said that.
But, it’s still true.
somehistory says
what he proposed sounds good….and many who don’t realize the full impact, will be all for that kind of life.
Who doesn’t want more time to spend with loved ones; to do fun things, and have time to just relax? What average citizen wouldn’t like to work fewer hours and still be paid a full amount?
He should be made to explain what it all means and in minute detail. Make him get down to the real nitty-gritty so that the average person will understand that he will be left holding the bag…and the bag will be empty and full of holes.