The Three Biggest Right-Wing Lies About Poverty

[unhappycamper]

http://www.opednews.com/articles/The-Three-Biggest-Right-Wi-by-Robert-Reich-Economy_Jobs_Lies-Republican_Poor-140613-89.html



The Three Biggest Right-Wing Lies About Poverty
By Robert Reich
OpEdNews Op Eds 6/13/2014 at 20:51:30

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Lie #1: Economic growth reduces poverty.

"The best anti-poverty program," wrote Paul Ryan, the House Budget Committee chairman, in the Wall Street Journal, "is economic growth."

Wrong. Since the late 1970s, the economy has grown 147 percent per capita but almost nothing has trickled down. The typical American worker is earning just about what he or she earned three decades ago, adjusted for inflation.

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Lie #2: Jobs reduce poverty.

Senator Marco Rubio said poverty is best addressed not by raising the minimum wage or giving the poor more assistance but with "reforms that encourage and reward work."

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But simply having a job is no bulwark against poverty. In fact, across America the ranks of the working poor have been growing. Around one-fourth of all American workers are now in jobs paying below what a full-time, full-year worker needs in order to live above the federally defined poverty line for a family of four.

[yeoman6987]

1. The Government should hire all the unemployed

If a person is laid off, the government should immediately hire that person and give them a job. The federal government actually has been slashed from thirty years ago. We could easily assimilate the unemployed into the federal government working at whatever the folks are good at. It would keep the economy flowing without disrupting the cash flow that happens when the employees are laid off. Sure some folks may even decide to make the federal government work a career but most will find something else later on. It really would work.....however, probably too bold for most.