Written by Curtis Ellis
A new “wage insurance” program
proposed by President Obama would have taxpayers subsidize the income
of workers who have had their jobs eliminated and who end up in new jobs
with lower salaries.
The
administration’s proposal to Congress acknowledges that the U.S.
economy has been producing mostly low-pay, low-skill jobs, as WND has
reported.
Many
Americans have seen their jobs eliminated as a result of so-called free
trade deals, offshoring, imports, unrestricted immigration and
globalization.
Experienced
workers on average see a pay cut of 10 percent when they lose their
jobs. Workers with more than 20 years on the job see an average 25
percent pay cut, according to the White House.
The
proposed “wage insurance” would replace half of the lost income, up to
$10,000 over two years. It would be available to workers who were with
their prior employer for three years and make less than $50,000 in their
new job.
Wage
insurance will be in the budget Obama submits to Congress next month.
He will also seek funds to retrain workers for new careers. Studies show such training programs have mixed success. When “retrained” workers find new jobs, it’s often at steeply lower wages.
President Obama pointed to wage insurance as part of his vision of a “new economy” for America in his State of the Union address.
Obama stated that “the global economy” means companies can locate anywhere in the world and have less loyalty to America.
But
rather than push for the domestic production of goods, as China and
many of America’s international trading partners do as a prerequisite
for access to their markets, the president called instead for a package
of government “benefits and protections” to provide “a basic measure of
security.”
At
their outset, Social Security and Medicare were envisioned as “old age
insurance” for those too old to work. Unemployment insurance was to
provide temporary assistance to those who were laid off through no fault
of their own.
With
wage insurance, critics says, the administration is extending
government assistance to job-holders as well as job-seekers and
resigning the nation’s citizens to a future of low-wage work and
government dependency.
The
president is selling the plan as a benefit to wage earners. But critics
charge it is actually another taxpayer handout to global corporatist
entities whose business model relies on cheap labor.
Washington’s policy of unrestricted immigration provides cheap labor to meatpackers. Low-paid immigrants make up a majority of the labor force in the U.S. meat and poultry industry.
The
government essentially subsidizes WalMart, which reported profits of
$130 billion in 2015. The retailer can cut payroll costs, critics argue,
because many of its employees receive food stamps.
While
the Obama administration acknowledges the dearth of better-paying jobs
in what it calls the “new economy,” it continues to pursue trade and
immigration policies that are lowering wages for Americans.
Obama
is pushing the TransPacific Partnership, one of the largest free-trade
agreements in history. Manufacturing jobs have disappeared from America
following the passage of North American Free Trade Agreement, NAFTA, and
China’s entry into the World Trade Organization.
The free trade policies have had an “ethnic cleansing” effect, according to a shocking study co-authored
by Angus Deaton, a Nobel laureate in economics. Middle aged, white,
working class men and women have been getting sicker and dying in
greater numbers since 1998, when the offshore outsourcing of factory
jobs went into high gear, according to the study.
The
study, published in the National Academy of Sciences journal, shows
life expectancy rose for other demographic groups in that period.
The
mortality rate for this group increased markedly between 1999 and 2013,
most likely because of drugs, alcohol and suicide, the Washington Post reported. Death rates for the same group dropped steadily before then.
“Half a million people are dead who should not be dead,” Deaton told the Washington Post.
White non-college educated voters, the group hardest hit, voted against Obama by a record 26 points in 2012.
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