–Finding the American dream on welfare and minimum wage

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Mitchell’s laws:
●The more federal budgets are cut and taxes increased, the weaker an economy becomes.
●Austerity is the government’s method for widening the gap between rich and poor, which ultimately leads to civil disorder.
●Until the 99% understand the need for federal deficits, the upper 1% will rule.
●To survive long term, a monetarily non-sovereign government must have a positive balance of payments.
●Those, who do not understand the differences between Monetary Sovereignty and monetary non-sovereignty, do not understand economics.
●The penalty for ignorance is slavery.
●Everything in economics devolves to motive.
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The so-called “religious” right, the Tea/Republican Party and all the politicians and media owned by the rich, have done a wonderful job of convincing the illiterati that poor people are lazy slugs.

The idea of federal support for the poor is repugnant to the rich and their sycophants, because as “everyone knows,” when you give money to the poor, you encourage sloth.

And if there is anything worse than a poor person, it’s a union member. As “everyone also knows,” unions not only are unnecessary but downright harmful to hard working Americans.

Why? Because business can be depended upon to pay workers a living wage and to provide a humane working environment.

I’m talking about such generous organizations as Wal-Mart, Macdonalds and all the other minimum-wage-or-less slavers who compounded their cruelty by making their underpaid employees work on Thanksgiving day, rather than be home with their families.

One solution to the starvation-level minimum wage would be to raise it. But no. That would allow people to feed their children, and worse yet, narrow the gap between the rich and the rest.

The right wing has a better solution. Cut welfare.

Here is what the billionaire Koch Brothers’ Cato Institute says:

Study: Welfare pays more than minimum wage in most states

[A new study by the libertarian think tank, Cato Institute, says]: Welfare benefits continue to outpace the income that most recipients can expect to earn from an entry-level job. And the balance between welfare and work may actually have grown worse in recent years.

To a right-winger, “worse” doesn’t mean pay is too low. No, “worse” means welfare benefits are too high, and should be cut.

If Congress and state legislatures are serious about reducing welfare dependence and rewarding work, they should consider reducing benefit levels and tightening eligibility requirements.

Can’t have those people getting rich on welfare, when they could starve working at Wal-Mart.

See, according to the Kochs’ Cato, if people are stuck in mid-ocean, clinging to a government inner tube, the tube should be taken away, so to make the people swim and, if necessary, drown, rather than create a dependence on that tube.

The Washington-based Center on Budget and Policy Priorities argues the study has several flaws, including that it “lumps together” a set of safety-net programs, including Medicaid, housing assistance and food stamps, and that “all poor families in which the parents aren’t working receive all of these benefits.”

In short, Cato created a study in cruelty and bias, sponsored by billionaires, who lounging comfortably on their yachts, can’t bear the thought of struggling people earning a living wage.

So they fund the propaganda that raising the minimum wage is inflationary or will cause unemployment — both lies — and brainwash the middle and lower classes to despise poor.

The single, biggest economic problem facing America today is the growing gap between the rich and the rest. Ironically, many of the middle and lower classes actually buy into what the right wing, Tea/Republicans (and even the Democrats) tell them.

CBS Moneywatch
Minimum wage a bad idea? Ask execs who pay even more

The biggest employers of minimum-wage workers are not predominantly small businesses that might struggle under an increased minimum wage, but rather some of the nation’s biggest employers: Companies such as Wal-Mart (WMT); Yum Brands (YUM), the owner of Taco Bell and Kentucky Fried Chicken, among others; McDonald’s (MCD); and Target (TGT).

Many of those employers are among the corporations with high executive compensation packages.

[Meanwhile,] Joel Benoliel, senior vice president and chief legal officer at Costco, said in a recent interview. “There’s a fundamental misunderstanding among many employers who focus on how little they can pay.

Our philosophy is that we actually pay less for labor per hour when we look at productivity and sales per hour.”

“We’d all be better off in our country if the lowest-paying jobs paid enough for people not to be on food stamps and not to be on welfare,” he added.

(Costco Wholesale Company typically pays its employees 8% above market. Similar employers pay their employees 4% below market. Similar companies include: Wal-Mart Stores, Inc, The Home Depot Inc.)

Check out this Walmart video, and see if saving a few cents on cotton is worth endorsing slavery.

Lincoln didn’t think so. Nor should you.

Rodger Malcolm Mitchell
Monetary Sovereignty

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Nine Steps to Prosperity:
1. Eliminate FICA (Click here)
2. Medicare — parts A, B & D plus long term nursing care — for everyone (Click here)
3. Send every American citizen an annual check for $5,000 or give every state $5,000 per capita (Click here)
4. Free education (including post-grad) for everyone. Click here
5. Salary for attending school (Click here)
6. Eliminate corporate taxes (Click here)
7. Increase the standard income tax deduction annually
8. Increase federal spending on the myriad initiatives that benefit America’s 99% (Click here)
9. Federal ownership of all banks (Click here)

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10 Steps to Economic Misery: (Click here:)
1. Maintain or increase the FICA tax..
2. Spread the myth Social Security, Medicare and the U.S. government are insolvent.
3. Cut federal employment in the military, post office, other federal agencies.
4. Broaden the income tax base so more lower income people will pay.
5. Cut financial assistance to the states.
6. Spread the myth federal taxes pay for federal spending.
7. Allow banks to trade for their own accounts; save them when their investments go sour.
8. Never prosecute any banker for criminal activity.
9. Nominate arch conservatives to the Supreme Court.
10. Reduce the federal deficit and debt

As the federal deficit growth lines drop, we approach recession, which will be cured only when the lines rise.

#MONETARY SOVEREIGNTY