Workers striking at fast-food restaurants and Walmart stores around the country are seeking more than better wages and working conditions for themselves. Their mission could yield benefits that would flow to virtually everyone in the American economy, which, despite modest improvements, still suffers from a critical shortage of decent paychecks.
We ought to be cheering on these striking workers, because they are pressing to secure what would amount to a dose of private-sector economic stimulus at a time when the government has proven wholly incapable of delivering a meaningful jolt. If these workers earn more money, they will spend it and spur economic growth.
Ever since President Barack Obama took office, Republicans have been monkey-wrenching the economy in a failed effort to parlay American pain into angry votes for Mitt Romney. With next year's midterm elections in its sights, the GOP is now redoubling on this cynical strategy, serving up a traditional offering of filibuster threats alongside a newly fortified helping of scandal-mongering to ensure that Washington is so dysfunctional that it can't agree on any spending -- not to hire teachers and cops, not to pay for social safety net programs, not for practically anything.
On its surface, the broadening labor movement among the lowest-paid ranks of the American workplace is a narrow development. People who make as little as $7.25 an hour are merely seeking to better their lot. Many of these people stocking aisles at big-box retail stores and squeezing ketchup onto hamburger patties at fast-food restaurants work full time, yet earn so little that they are poor by any official or commonsense standard. They cannot afford groceries or car payments, let alone pay for health care or support families.
No comments:
Post a Comment