For a ‘Living Wage’ America, Cap the Top

[marmar]

from Too Much: A Commentary on Excess and Inequality:



For a ‘Living Wage’ America, Cap the Top
March 7, 2010 ⋅ Post a comment

The White House wants to require firms that do business with the government to pay decent wages. That could work — if we go after all pay that’s indecent.

By Sam Pizzigati


Labels can often cloud reality. Take the labels of “private” and “public” sector. We employ these labels all the time, to divide our economy into totally separate compartments, as if the “private” and “public” sectors represented two entirely different economic universes.

In reality, private and public sectors overlap and interlace, profoundly and incessantly. How connected have the two sectors become? A quarter of Americans work for firms that have contracts with the federal government.

Huge numbers of other Americans work for companies with contracts from state and local governments. Still more private enterprises regularly pocket public tax dollars, by the billions, for economic development grants and subsidies.

Without all these tax dollars, the U.S. economy would grind to a halt. And that reality, savvy policy makers have always understood, creates some interesting opportunities. By leveraging the power of the public purse — by denying, for instance, tax dollars to companies that behave poorly — governments can encourage business behavior that helps us build a better society.

Back in the 1960s, during the civil rights movement, activists acted on that reality. They pressed President John Kennedy to require federal contractors to put in place nondiscriminatory employment practices, and he did. ..........(more)

The complete piece is at: http://toomuchonline.org/for-a-living-wage-america-cap-the-top/