The Obama propaganda machine has given us a new social class, a conglomeration of middle and working class families said to be suffering from low pay and meager job benefits. This group doesn’t have a name. It was created out of sheer political opportunism and the need to confuse voters about what they are supporting. Let’s be forthright and call this target of election year generosity what it really is: poor people who can’t be called “poor” because it would insinuate that the president is failing. Instead, we have working and middle class Americans who are not getting a fair shot and only earn minimum wage.
The White House is devoting a lot of effort to the problem of making it in America, spreading the plight of families over decades instead of taking responsibility for the here and now:
Over the past 30 years, modest minimum wage increases have not kept pace with the rising costs of basic necessities for working families. No one who works full time should have to raise his or her family in poverty.1
The Obama propaganda mill reassigns poor people to the middle class because it makes the situation seem more urgent. We can’t let the bedrock of America go under, so how do we help this new social class the White House created, working middle class poor people?
Obama propaganda argues poor people should earn more, work less.
Should employers shell out for more perks and pay raises for poor working families? Those of us who work for small businesses know how few and far between pay raises can be. Wages and benefits are expensive, especially if you buy into Obama propaganda that members of the middle class earn minimum wage and need a whopping big pay hike (see: Poor People Are Behind Obama’s Middle Class Spending). The president has said that raising the minimum wage helps workers without raising taxes or spending more money.2 He is right about that. A government-mandated pay raise is not a new tax on businesses. It’s a government-mandated welfare payment.
Raising low wages isn’t the only priority. The White House wants to give workers more time off, too.
Minimum wage doesn’t include paid family leave?
In the business world we call family leave and flexible work schedules perks. You don’t get a lot of those with a minimum wage job. Free enterprise means the more valuable you are, the more businesses will pay to keep you. Obama propaganda sees things differently, preferring to turn perks into bottom line basic needs for talented employees3 who, inexplicably, also need a chance to get ahead because their earnings are too low despite their abilities.
The problem with poor people is that they need more money. The Obama propaganda mill is pushing to take that money from businesses without telling the president’s supplicants just how much a higher minimum wage and more time off is going to cost them in lost jobs and opportunity. Democrats call it pro-labor. Free enterprise calls it anti-business. Either way, it’s a set of policies transferring individual responsibility to employers.
Instead of leaving the decision to businesses, Republicans offered a government solution to family leave, the Working Families Flexibility Act. The bill granted comp time in lieu of pay, not a great offer for workers not earning enough to make up the difference. Democrats were not amused, so the White House came up with a bad idea of its own that’s close to what Republicans proposed. The difference? Adding “paid” in front of “family leave.”
Parting thought on social class and Obama propaganda: don’t have kids.
One of the reasons working poor families are such an issue is that they are families. Instead of finding ways for employers to prop up workers who can’t make it with low wage jobs, how about dedicating some propaganda to convincing them to stop having kids they can’t afford, just like we should have told Americans that taking out mortgages they could not pay was a stupid decision, not a right? Supporting one or two is a lot easier than supporting six, even though it won’t result in as many future Democratic votes. It won’t give the party this confusing new social class to pander to, either.