Minimum Wage Isn’t Enough!
Capitalism is not going to work. It never has, it never will. The only winners in capitalism are the wealthy owners and shareholders filling their wallets with the profits earned by the workforce. Plus, they connive with the politicians from both parties, so they pay little to nothing in taxes.
Capitalism cares nothing for the workers beyond having them put their maximum efforts into their work so that maximum profits are earned. Unfortunately, by design, wages are kept to the absolute minimum that can be gotten away with. This leaves the society in the death grip of Capitalism.
Add into the situation the loss of jobs due to the coronavirus. Businesses have been forced to close, some permanently. In the first legislation passed to help during this pandemic, each adult received $1200.00 in a direct payment, along with $500.00 for each dependent child. Plus, every worker who lost their job would receive and additional $600.00 per week in unemployment payments over and above the unemployment pay rate. That money would be sorely needed for people to be able to for their living expenses. Also put into place by local and state authorities were moratoriums on evictions. Home foreclosures happened through law and mandates from individual States.
This was considered a lifeline to workers across America. Capitalism at it’s finest, at least in the minds of the politicians and wealthy corporation owners & stockholders. There are two issues I have with this government “aid.” First, the “benefits” expired this past Friday, July 31, 2020. No more $600.00 a week increases, throwing millions of Americans into jeopardy of being unable to sustain themselves and their families. The second issue is that had corporations been structured to reward workers, instead of enslaving them, they wouldn’t have been in such dire straits to sustain themselves and their families.
Why should workers be exploited like this? The federal minimum wage in the United States currently stands at $7.25 per hour. The highest State mandated minimum wage is $15.00 per hour in the District of Columbia. A person working 40 hours a week will, based of the two minimum wages, earn from $15.080.00 to $31,200.00 per year. Keep in mind that this is gross income. The average tax rate for all taxpayers is 21%. So, using this rate, a person has net income of $11,913.20 to $24,648.00 yearly. These amounts do not account for other variables like health insurance or retirement plans as examples.
Looking at poverty guidelines, see the chart, for 2020 shows the poverty line by the number of people in a household:
| Persons in family/household | Poverty guideline |
|---|---|
| For families/households with 1 to 5 persons. | |
| 1 | $12,760 |
| 2 | $17,240 |
| 3 | $21,720 |
| 4 | $26,200 |
| 5 | $30,680 |
A single person can not survive on these wages, regardless of whether or not they are above the poverty line. Try it if you don’t believe me. If you have a family of four (2 parents with 2 children), one income will not allow a family to survive. Two jobs will be the only way to hope to survive, maybe. We are not taking into consideration the cost of living where the employee lives. New York City is going to be much more expensive compared to Rapid City, ND.
Yet, the corporations are making profits that run from hundreds of millions to billions of dollars. The owners and shareholders are making obscene amounts of money, of the backs of their workers. In 2019 Sundar Pichai, Alphabet Inc., (owner of Google) received over $280 million. Amazon’s Jeff Bezos is making billions of dollars during the COVID pandemic!
Yet, workers will struggle to survive because Capitalism requires workers at slave wages. Capitalism is a economic system keeping workers in thrall. When will the lives of workers and their families become more important than the almighty Capitalist dollar?
Capitalism needs to go, the sooner the better. That or it must be turned upside down and compensate workers by giving them a voice on the boards of corporations and pay that removes the necessity of government aid just to try to survive. In addition, workers are entitled to decent housing, quality healthcare, income regardless of whether they are off sick/injured or working their job, less work hours in a week, and a fair system providing a secure retirement, among other things.
Capitalism will never value the human lives that make the owners/shareholders wealthier, while workers struggle.
So, tell me again that workers don’t need to be an extra $600.00 a week if they are currently unemployed due to the COVID-19 coronavirus? Explain how people may end up evicted and homeless or will be even more reluctant to seek medical attention and that’s okay?
Capitalism is one of the enemies that must be defeated in order to have a better America. Those ugly wealthy must pay for their exploitation of workers.
Kill Capitalism now!
Until next time
American Dystopia 