Feel the Bern! Again.
Senator
Bernie Sanders recently announced a plan that would guarantee a job, salary,
and benefits to any American “who wants or needs one.” According to the
Washington Post, the jobs would be for public works projects, including
infrastructure, the environment, education, and “care giving,” among other
fields. The Post reported that the proposal
“imagines” tasking the country’s existing job training centers and employment
offices with connecting workers to these projects. Theoretically, anyone could
visit a job center and receive either job training or a job on one of these
projects.
The idea’s
proponents believe that millions of Americans could be hired in this manner,
more during economic recessions afflicting the private sector and fewer during
economic boom times. The plan would necessitate the greatest government
involvement in the nation’s economy in its history. It would mandate a
$15-per-hour minimum wage and the same medical, dental, and vision benefits as
federal government employees receive, and would also provide paid family and
medical leave.
In
addition, the senator from the Green Mountain State promised his plan would
provide “a chicken in every pot, pot in every chicken, free unicorns for every
child, and lots of other amazing free shit.” He added he was “currently
negotiating with the Tooth Fairy” to impose the equivalent of a $15-per-fang
minimum pay-out on all collected baby teeth, “maybe even $20 for molars and
bicuspids.”
Senators
Cory Booker (D-N.J.) and Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), among others, are also supporting
the elderly socialist’s plan.
The
senescent Senator Sanders has been hugely—if oddly-- popular with millennials,
garnering 73% of their vote in the Democratic 2016 presidential primary against
Hillary Clinton, for example. This plan may risk alienating some members of his
base, however, as many millennials would rather have a guarantee that they
could be job-free for the rest of
their lives. If the senator modifies his proposal by dropping just a word or
two, though, he might have nearly unanimous support among young people. If he
would guarantee a salary and benefits to any American “who wants or needs one,”
even if they do not have a job, he
would likely be elected in a landslide of unprecedented proportions.
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