The GOP's Absurd Plan for the Economy: Lowering YOUR Wages

[marmar]

AlterNet / By Joshua Holland

The GOP's Absurd Plan for the Economy: Lowering YOUR Wages
The GOP is embracing some very dangerous voodoo economics.

March 28, 2011 |


Earlier this month, House Republicans laid out a perverse plan to lower working Americans' wages, supposedly in a bid to get employers to hire more of them (PDF). One would be hard-pressed to find a better example of the “race to the bottom.”

Republican staffers on the Joint Economic Committee released the study in response to widespread criticism that the deep public sector cuts they've advocated threaten to derail an already anemic “recovery” -- economist Mark Zandi estimated last month that if enacted, the spending cuts would cost the U.S. economy 700,000 jobs through 2012.

So, as Tim Fernholz and Jim Tankersley wrote in the National Journal, the GOP report “makes the party’s ... case that fiscal consolidation (read: spending cuts) can spur immediate economic growth and reduce unemployment.”

The paper calls for cuts that are “large, credible, and politically difficult to reverse once made,” and offers a typical conservative fantasy about shuttering entire federal agencies. But topping the list of what should be on the Republicans' chopping block is “decreasing the number and compensation of government workers,” which the staffers say will spur job creation because “a smaller government workforce increases the available supply of educated, skilled workers for private firms, thus lowering labor costs.” .................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.alternet.org/news/150400/the_gop%27s_absurd_plan_for_the_economy%3A_lowering_your_wages/

[baldguy]

1. Cheap labor conservatives.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x2682896

[old mark]

2. K&R- The GOP has had its way in the House and has not yet created a single job.

They don't care about any of the American people who are not rich contributers.


mark

[Scuba]

3. Slavery worked well for them in the past, didn't it? n/t

[opihimoimoi]

4. They have no idea in national economics...what they do is crazy

[theaocp]

5. I humbly suggest the pukes

lead by example.

But topping the list of what should be on the Republicans' chopping block is “decreasing the number and compensation of government workers,” which the staffers say will spur job creation because “a smaller government workforce increases the available supply of educated, skilled workers for private firms, thus lowering labor costs.”

So, when can we expect their resignations to go work in the private industry? :eyes:

[rasputin1952]

6. The party of, "we got rid of slavery" Lincoln...

wants to enslave all the citizens this time around.

These people are truly pathetic, (and dangerous).

VOTE!!! Get these clowns out of the political arena!

[LiberalEsto]

7. They can't lower zero, can they?

Unfortunately, I think they can and will.
Those of us who are unemployed, and don't have wages that can be cut, are seeing other reductions in the ability to survive.
I'm one of the lucky ones - at least my husband has a job. But:

Unemployment benefit periods are being shortened in some states.
Public assistance services and programs are being cut.
Food and gas prices are going way up.
Those jobs that are still available offer lower wages than pre-Depression.

[Historic NY]

8. Lower wages means more corporate profit......Boner where's the damn jobs?

[dawg]

9. I can't believe they are getting so bold...

as to be out in the open about all of this. Of course, their end game is to lower labor costs and increase the share of wealth going to their paymasters.

Working-class voters who support the Republican party are idiots. And we are incompetent for not being able to persuade them otherwise when we have ammunition like this.

[udbcrzy2]

10. Maybe they should lower their own wages first.

If you make minimum wage and you have to buy gas for your car to get to work, that means that almost 1/2 of your wages are spent on getting to work.

Besides that, those minimum wage jobs are usually part-time too and it still takes the same amount of gas to get there.