[NJFAC] Americans Across the Political Divide Want a Federal Job Guarantee

Americans Across the Political Divide Want a Federal Job Guarantee ByThe Center for Working-Class Politics

A look at all the available survey data on public support for a job guarantee shows consistently strong support for the idea. It's a winning idea for the Left.

Workers prepare to lift a new pedestrian bridge into place at the Stamford Transportation Center on August 26, 2023 in Stamford, Connecticut. (John Moore / Getty Images)

There has been steadily increasing interest in a federal job guarantee since Bernie Sanders reintroduced the concept to the American public in the wake of the 2016 presidential primaries.

The idea of a job guarantee is to provide a public option for struggling workers to find gainful employment — especially contributing to badly needed public infrastructure projects but also a wide range of other service-based work in education, health, recreation, and the arts. The idea has a long history in the United States going back to the large-scale job creation programs of the New Deal in the 1930s to the lesser-known Comprehensive Employment and Training Act (CETA) that, by 1978, had put 725,000 people into public sector employment.

Job guarantees, explained Dylan Matthews Imagine if a well-paying job were a human right.

Support for a job guarantee is remarkably consistent across key demographics, including partisanship. A 2023 survey by Data for Progress, for example, found that while Democrats were more likely to support the policy than other voters (88 percent of Democrats responded favorably), independents were also overwhelmingly supportive (74 percent), as were a solid majority of Republicans, particularly those under forty-five.

....

Yet the surveys also show that how you present a job guarantee to voters matters. Not surprisingly, given many Americans' concerns about government spending, the two polls that tied a jobs program to potentially costly guarantees of a "good standard of living" (American National Election Studies) or a high guaranteed minimum wage and government-guaranteed health care (Rasmussen) found less backing.....

ps here is the website of CWCP:The Center for Working Class Politics jz

The Center for Working Class Politics

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June Zaccone
National Jobs for All Network
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[NJFAC] Bloomberg:Corporate America Never Really Quit Forced Labor

Corporate America Never Really Quit Forced Labor

Inmates do billions of dollars of work for companies and governments each year. A landmark lawsuit alleges many are being kept in prison because the business is just too good. By Josh Eidelson May 11, 2024

Lakiera Walker was lying in her bunk bed a year ago, sick with flu and too weak to stand, when a prison supervisor came in to chastise her for missing the afternoon van to work. Walker's job was on an assembly line at Southeastern Meats Inc., a supermarket supplier. The 12-hour shifts on her feet in 30-some-degree cold made her body ache and turned her fingers a deep red. Southeastern Meats paid about $13 an hour for Walker's work packaging its frozen peas and corn, but the state pocketed most of that, including two-fifths for the Alabama Department of Corrections to "assist in defraying the cost" of her incarceration.

That afternoon, a fellow inmate would need to carry Walker to a medical ward. But when the ADOC officer found her in her room, she says, her health wasn't his concern.

"I am so sick," she told him.

"Get up and go make us our 40%," he replied.

"It made me feel," Walker recalls, "like he was a pimp."

Now Walker, a 37-year-old recently paroled after 15 years in prison, has teamed up with nine still-incarcerated fellow plaintiffs, as well as some prominent labor lawyers and unions, to file a class action. They're suing Alabama Governor Kay Ivey, the state's attorney general, the prisons commissioner, parole board leaders, and a slew of cities, along with companies they claim rely on forced labor, including Hyundai supplier Ju-Young, beer distributor Bama Budweiser of Montgomery, and franchisees of KFC, McDonald's, and Wendy's. The workers suing are all Black. Their class action accuses the defendants of human trafficking, racketeering and violating the Ku Klux Klan Act, which targets conspiracies to deprive people of their constitutional rights. They argue that the government officials colluded to keep Black people imprisoned and available as cheap labor and that the companies conspired to profit from the coerced work. The suit, filed right before Christmas, says it seeks "to abolish a modern-day form of slavery." ....

There are 800,000 incarcerated workers in the US, and they do roughly $10 billion worth of work a year, more than $2 billion of it for clients outside the prison system, according to a 2022 study by the American Civil Liberties Union and the University of Chicago.....

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June Zaccone
National Jobs for All Network
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[NJFAC] US Billionaires Pay Lower Tax Rate Than Working Class for First Time

'Absurd!': US Billionaires Pay Lower Tax Rate Than Working Class for First Time "It's time to tax the billionaires," economist Gabriel Zucman argues in a new analysis. Jake Johnson Common Dreams, May 03, 2024

An analysis published Friday by the renowned economist Gabriel Zucman shows that in 2018, U.S. billionaires paid a lower effective tax rate than working-class Americans for the first time in the nation's history, a data point that sparked a new flurry of calls for bold levies on the ultra-rich.....

To begin reversing the decades-long trend of surging inequality that has weakened democratic institutions and undermined critical programs such as Social Security, Zucman made the case for a minimum tax on billionaires in the U.S. and around the world.

"The idea that billionaires should pay a minimum amount of income tax is not a radical idea," Zucman wrote Friday. "What is radical is continuing to allow the wealthiest people in the world to pay a smaller percentage in income tax than nearly everybody else. In liberal democracies, a wave of political sentiment is building, focused on rooting out the inequality that corrodes societies. A coordinated minimum tax on the super-rich will not fix capitalism. But it is a necessary first step."....

"The idea that billionaires should pay a minimum amount of income tax is not a radical idea," Zucman wrote Friday. "What is radical is continuing to allow the wealthiest people in the world to pay a smaller percentage in income tax than nearly everybody else. In liberal democracies, a wave of political sentiment is building, focused on rooting out the inequality that corrodes societies. A coordinated minimum tax on the super-rich will not fix capitalism. But it is a necessary first step."

Responding to those who claim a minimum tax would be impractical because "wealth is difficult to value," Zucman wrote that "this fear is overblown."...

The last 2 paragraphs seem inconsistent--a tax on wealth is not a min. tax on income.  However, from the Times article: "There is a way to make tax dodging less attractive: a global minimum tax. In 2021, more than 130 countries agreed to apply a minimum tax rate of 15 percent on the profits of large multinational companies. So no matter where a company parks its profits, it still has to pay at least a baseline amount of tax under the agreement.... ....another coordinated minimum tax — this one not on corporations, but on billionaires. The idea is simple. Let's agree that billionaires should pay income taxes equivalent to a small portion — say, 2 percent — of their wealth each year. Someone like Bernard Arnault, who is worth about $210 billion, would have to pay an additional tax equal to roughly $4.2 billion if he pays no income tax. In total, the proposal would allow countries to collect an estimated $250 billion in additional tax revenue per year, which is even more than what the global minimum tax on corporations is expected to add."

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June Zaccone
National Jobs for All Network
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[NJFAC] US firms have little incentive to pay the minimum wage

US Firms Have Little Financial Incentive to Comply with the Minimum Wage Posted on April 19, 2024 by Yves Smith

US Firms Have Little Financial Incentive to Comply with the Minimum Wage... More on "American hates the poors": companies face hardly any downside in cheating on disgracefully low minimum ...

Yves here. This is pathetic. America has a super low Federal minimum wage, of $7.25 an hour. It was increased to that level in 2009. That is equivalent to roughly $10.60 an hour, using a CPI calculator, which understates the increases in the cost of living to low-income workers, based on food price increases alone.

But on top of that, it turns out cheating pays. Minimum wage enforcement is so weak and fines are so low that non-compliance is a good economic bet.

By Anna Stansbury, Assistant Professor in Work and Organization Studies Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Originally published at VoxEU

A minimum wage is only effective to the degree it is actually paid – and research suggests that minimum wage non-compliance is very common. This column uses data on all violations of the Fair Labor Standards Act in the US documented since 2005 to ask what incentives US firms have to comply with the federal minimum wage. While the law allows for large penalties, average penalty levels are far too low to give most firms an incentive to comply. As the federal minimum wage is increased, higher penalties and greater enforcement will be needed to ensure compliance.

The US federal minimum wage is the baseline labour market protection for low-wage workers. Debates rage over how high it should be, in policy and in academia (e.g. Roth et al 2022, Cazes and Garnero 2023). ¹ But a minimum wage is only effective to the degree it is actually paid – and research suggests that minimum wage non-compliance is very common. Random Department of Labor inspections of fast food outlets over 2001-2005, for example, found 40% in violation of Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) minimum wage or overtime provisions, and random garment industry inspections in 2015-2016 found FLSA violations in 85% of workplaces (Weil 2014, 2018). ²

US firms have little financial incentive to comply with the minimum wage A minimum wage is only effective to the degree it is actually paid – and research suggests that minimum wage non...

In a new paper (Stansbury 2024), I compile case-level data on all FLSA violations identified by the Department of Labor since 2005 – combining publicly available data obtained in a Freedom of Information request. I use these data to ask: What incentive do US firms have to comply with the federal minimum wage? This question is important to understand the efficacy of existing minimum wage legislation, as well as to interpret other minimum wage research, including estimates of disemployment effects.

How to quantify a firm's incentive to comply with the minimum wage? A long tradition in economics applies a cost-benefit framework to compliance decisions, suggesting that a profit-maximising company complies with the law if the extra profits made by breaking the law are less than the expected costs (Becker 1968). Taking this cost-benefit approach, I use data on penalties levied on violators to infer the penalties firms can expect to face under different scenarios – and thus, to estimate the degree to which firms have an incentive to comply with the minimum wage, under different assumptions about the probability of detection.

While the law allows for large penalties, few firms face penalties over and above paying the wages that they owed

The FLSA requires that all firms who underpay the minimum wage pay the back wages owed. They can also be required to pay an equal amount in liquidated damages. Willful or repeat violators can be charged a civil monetary penalty. In certain cases, the 'hot goods provision' can be used to embargo goods made in violation of the FLSA. And the most serious violators can be referred for criminal prosecution.

Yet, my analysis of the Department of Labor data shows that most firms face minimal costs for underpaying the minimum wage, over and above paying workers the wages originally owed.

Liquidated damages can in theory be levied on a large share of minimum wage violations. They were, however, almost never levied in DOL cases prior to 2012. This policy has changed in more recent years (Weil 2018). By 2022/2023, more than 30% of cases concluded had liquidated damages assessed. The remaining two thirds did not.....

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June Zaccone
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[NJFAC] What Is a ‘Decent Wage’? France’s Michelin Raises a Debate.

What Is a 'Decent Wage'? France's Michelin Raises a Debate.    

By Liz Alderman

The tire maker vowed to ensure that none of its workers would struggle to make ends meet.

....

Last week, the 134-year-old company, which has 132,000 workers at 131 factories in 26 countries, announced that it would guarantee all of its employees a "decent wage" wherever they were in the world, part of a broader social plan intended to ensure that none of its workers would have to struggle to make ends meet.....

Mr. Menegaux declined to divulge how much Michelin's lowest-paid workers around the world had been earning, but said their pay was higher than the minimum wage where they lived, which he described as "not a decent salary." He added that a living wage was a way to help move employees "at the bottom of the ladder up."....

In creating its "decent wage," the company, known for its rubbery Michelin Man mascot, referred to standards set by the United Nations Global Compact: a salary enabling a family of four to live "decently" in the city where they work. That means not running out of money before the end of the month after paying basic expenses and being able to save and spend modestly on goods or leisure activities, Mr. Menegaux said.....

Michelin turned to the Fair Wage Network, a nongovernmental organization based in Switzerland, to assess its salary structure. The resulting study found that 5 percent, or around 7,000, of Michelin's employees worldwide were not earning enough.

In response, Michelin adapted its salary scales to the cost of living in cities where its factories operated. In Beijing, the group increased the lowest pay level to 69,312 yuan per year, or a little less than €9,000. In Greenville, N.C., workers' base pay rose to the equivalent of €40,000 per year.

In France, where the gross minimum wage is €21,203 per year, the company lifted the salaries of its lowest-paid workers to €39,638 in Paris and €25,356 in Clermont-Ferrand, where the company's headquarters are and where the cost of living is lower than Paris's.....

...Nicolas Robert, a representative for the Union syndicale Solidaires, one of France's biggest labor organizations, said of Michelin's wage pledge. He said workers at the Clermont Ferrand factories who got the living-wage increases earned around €1,700 a month after taxes — not enough to support a family of four without welfare supplements.

"After you pay your housing, food, energy and transport, not much is left," Mr. Robert said. "What they call a decent salary is far from reality: We have many workers who have been in survival mode since inflation exploded."....

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June Zaccone
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[NJFAC] Galbraith: Bidenomics and Its Discontents

Bidenomics and Its Discontents https://www.thenation.com/article/economy/bidenomics-criticism-economy-election/ James K. Galbraith 3/27/24

The White House believes American workers have seldom had it so good. And lots of prestigious economists agree. But the voters aren't buying. Maybe they know something?

....

Take the unemployment rate. It is a ratio of those seeking work to the whole active labor force. In past times, most households depended on a single earner, for whom holding a job was a make-or-break proposition. If unemployment was rising or high—say 7 percent, typical in recessions—then, even though 93 percent of the labor force was still working, fear of unemployment amplified the woes of those actually out of work. Conversely, if unemployment was low or falling, most workers felt reasonably secure. The unemployment rate, back then, was a reasonable indicator of distress or well-being.

Those days are long gone. Today's typical American working household has several earners, sometimes in multiple jobs. If one earner loses a job while the others keep theirs, she may leave the workforce for a time; there is the option of making do with less, and for some there is early retirement. She will not, in that case, count as unemployed—however difficult her life. A low jobless rate can mask a great deal of stress in such households. The employment-to-population ratio is still a bit below where it was in 2020, and far below where it was in 2000; average weekly hours are still falling.....

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June Zaccone
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[NJFAC] BlackRock CEO recommends that we retire later

A solution to the retirement crisis? Americans should work for more years, BlackRock CEO says

By Aimee Picchi March 27, 2024 /

With Americans living longer and spending more years in retirement, the nation's changing demographics are "putting the U.S. retirement system under immense strain," according to BlackRock CEO Larry Fink in his annual shareholder letter. 

One way to fix it, he suggests, is for Americans to work longer before they head into retirement.

"No one should have to work longer than they want to. But I do think it's a bit crazy that our anchor idea for the right retirement age — 65 years old — originates from the time of the Ottoman Empire," Fink wrote in his 2024 letter, which largely focuses on the retirement crisis facing the U.S. and other nations as their populations age. [Apparently he doesn't know that the Social Security age for full retirement has already been increased.jz]

Fink, who is worth an estimated $1.2 billion, notes that many 65-year-olds in the early 1950s didn't get a chance to retire because many had already passed away. In other words, he writes, more than half of workers who had paid into Social Security never got a penny because they died before they could claim the benefit.

"Today, these demographics have completely unraveled, and this unraveling is obviously a wonderful thing," Fink added. "We should want more people to live more years. But we can't overlook the massive impact on the country's retirement system."

[He'll be glad to know that life expectancy has been falling. Does he know that highly unequal incomes, like his, deprive SS of revenues? The payroll tax stops at incomes above $168,600 [2024].  jz] ....

Fink heads Black Rock, "the world's largest asset manager, with $10 trillion in assets under management."

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June Zaccone
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