Bernie Gives Glimpse of How His America Would Look, Attacks Disney Over 'Unfair' Wages
The radical left’s favorite socialist wants Disney to “feel the Bern” — but it could have serious consequences on the economy.
Apparently desperate to stay relevant, former presidential candidate Bernie Sanders has shifted his sights from the White House to Disneyland.
According to BizPac Review, the Vermont senator is rallying behind a California proposal that would force Disney to hike its minimum wage, even though it would almost certainly lead to lost jobs.
“Sponsored by a coalition of local unions, the November ballot measure … would force Disney and other large employers that accept ‘subsidies’ from Anaheim to pay their employees a minimum of $15 an hour starting in 2019,” BizPac explained. “They would then be required to raise their minimum wage by $1 per year until 2022.”
That would mean an $18-per-hour minimum wage in just a few years, a 63-percent increase from the state’s current $11 hourly minimum.
Great, right? Maybe if you’re used to Micky Mouse math.
“If a corporation like Disney has enough to pay its CEO over $400 million in a four-year period, it damn well has enough to pay its workers at least 15 bucks an hour,” the 76-year-old socialist told a crowd of supporters in Anaheim.
That quote by itself is enough to make Sanders look rather goofy. Some simple math shows just how ignorant the Vermont senator’s comment actually is.
Disney has around 200,000 employees. Let’s say Sanders got his way, and literally took every single dollar of the Disney CEO’s $400 million in four-year compensation. That number actually includes stock options and incentives — it isn’t a paycheck — but let’s play Bernie’s game.
If socialists seized all of that pay, it would cover a measly $500 bonus per year for each Disney employee, for four years. Then it would be dried up and one of the most successful companies in the world wouldn’t have a CEO.
Assuming a 40-hour work week, $500 a year equates to a fairly inconsequential raise of 25 cents an hour. Yes, Sanders’ oh-so-genius scheme of stealing every dime from a CEO would only mean an extra quarter in people’s pockets, stolen from somebody else, and that’s before the crippling income taxes the liberal also wants.
But it gets worse. Despite the liberal obsession with constantly raising the minimum wage with no regard for consequences, it turns out that there’s no such things as a free lunch … even at Disneyland.
“While touting himself as a friend of the working man, Bernie has come all this way to support a measure that will result in thousands of lost jobs for the people of Anaheim,” scolded Todd Ament, who leads the Anaheim Chamber of Commerce.
Economics experts ranging from Ament to respected Microsoft founder Bill Gates have warned that when you raise minimum wage too high, people lose their jobs in droves.
“You have to be a bit careful that if you raise the minimum wage, you’re encouraging labor substitution. You’re going to go buying machines and automate things — or cause jobs to appear outside of that jurisdiction. And so within certain limits, you know, it does cause job destruction,” Gates pointed out on MSNBC recently.
It’s already happening.
“The casual dining franchise Red Robin laid off hundreds of workers earlier this year in response to minimum wage hikes in localities across the country. Three years ago the coffeehouse chain Dunkin’ Donuts likewise began shuttering 100 locations because of minimum wage increases,” BizPac Review pointed out.
It’s common sense, which is apparently incredibly uncommon for people like Sanders. You might be able to force businesses to raise wages to a point, but not without consequences … and past that point, companies begin cutting jobs in order to cover the skyrocketing expenses.
California, ironically, is a perfect example. The once-proud state now has the highest rate of poverty in the entire nation, thanks in part to liberal policies like the kind Sanders wants to implement everywhere.
We’re already seeing companies like McDonald’s and Wendy’s embracing automation, with kiosks and even burger-flipping robots replacing what used to be reliable starting jobs for teenagers.
What’s the point of a huge minimum wage if inflation immediately rises, everything becomes more expensive, and only the most skilled and in-demand workers can actually find jobs?
Liberals seem stuck pushing old, disproved socialist theories that only lead to misery — or complete ruin in places like Venezuela.
Meanwhile, the economy under a Republican president is booming, and there are more jobs available for all Americans than ever before in recent history.
Sanders was a failure as a candidate. His proposals would mean failure for American companies, and even much-loved brands like Disney would be turned into disasters if his version of socialism is allowed to take root.
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