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E-mailThe perpetual poverty ticket
Colin McNickle is the Trib's director of editorial pages. Ring him at 412-320-7836. E-mail him at: cmcnickle@tribweb.com.
"In the end it's about values," said presumptive nominee John Kerry in Chicago on July 2. A day before, he added the "spirit of our country" to the mix.
Early on the morning of July 6, he told newly minted running mate John Edwards, by phone from his wife's Fox Chapel estate, that theirs would be an effort "to take back America."
Now we're told that at the party convention, bowing July 26 in Boston, the theme will be "Stronger at Home; Respected in the World."
I can only imagine that the post-convention theme will be just as inane. Perhaps "The Future: It's Where We're Headed"?
Of course none of this Madisonian (as in Madison Avenue, Lord knows not James Madison) public relations stuff much jibes with the programs these Johns (take the reference any way that strikes your fancy) propose.
Take, for instance, raising the minimum wage.
On June 18, Mr. Kerry called for jacking up the federal wage floor from $5.15 to $7 an hour by 2007. It's "part of his plan to build a stronger economy for America's families," his campaign said. The increase, affecting nearly 15 million workers, would help those families "make ends meet and move another step towards the American Dream," it added.
Liberals and socialists (is there a difference?) probably are nodding their heads vigorously about now. "Yeah, that's the ticket! Go, Johnny, Go!" But those with even a novitiate's understanding of basic economics -- and the patience to research the record and to put the statistics into their proper context -- are shaking their heads in disbelief. For Sen. Kerry is committing a populist fraud.
A Heritage Foundation analysis of 2003 U.S. Census data shows that of the immediate "beneficiaries" of a change in the minimum wage -- 7.8 million workers -- only 15 percent lived in poverty. Nearly three-quarters of these workers have family income at least 50 percent higher than the poverty line. More than half have family income that is double the poverty level. One-fifth had family incomes of more than $80,000 annually. The average: a respectable $40,000.
"In other words, the typical beneficiary of a minimum wage increase will not be a poor father or mother scrambling to keep a family fed, clothed and housed," said Heritage's Paul Kersey in testimony before Congress in May. The primary beneficiaries? Solid members of the middle class, the data show.
Worse, however, is that raising the minimum wage lowers the pool of available jobs. It's elementary: if you raise the cost of labor -- and without a concomitant increase in productivity -- fewer laborers are hired. "(T)he average estimate by labor economists is that for a 10 percent increase in the minimum wage, employment among those affected drops by 5 percent," Mr. Kersey testified.
The kind of increase Kerry is proposing could result in about a 15 percent decline in jobs. And if there are fewer jobs -- hundreds of thousands of fewer jobs in this case -- there are fewer opportunities for young people of all socioeconomic classes to find entry-level positions, the prerequisite for learning how to work and advancing up the employment opportunity ladder.
Do we really want to create an entirely new class of Americans who not only don't know how to work but also don't understand that pay is based on merit and productivity and not an "entitlement" produced by government fiat?
What kind of "value system" advocates a measure that shrinks the job pool?
Is it really in the "spirit" of our nation to, by government decree and in perversion of the free market, deny someone his first job?
How do we "take back America" by raising unemployment?
This makes us "stronger at home" and "respected in the world"?
This is the "American Dream"?
If John Kerry can't get comprehend something so simple and so basic, what can we expect of him regarding really complicated economic matters? An ever deeper dive into your pockets, that's what.
John Kerry and John Edwards, two Johns pimping for a populism that can only perpetuate poverty, haven't a clue. Now there's a campaign theme, eh?
Colin McNickle will be in Boston beginning next week editorializing on the Democratic National Convention.
