The Democrats have taken to calling the bill designed to rescue the U.S. economy a “slush fund” for big business and the banks.
Thoughtful questions can be raised about the rescue bill, as Amity Shlaes does.
But the “slush fund” charge, which even presidential candidate Joe Biden has employed in one of his counter-Trump coronavirus addresses, isn’t one of them.
As the Wall Street Journal notes:
It is a political non sequitur for the ages: Democrat after Democrat, taking to the Senate floor or their favorite media megaphones, declaring that they want to help “workers” and “families” cope with the coronavirus fallout rather than help businesses and corporations.
“We need a bill that puts workers first and not corporations,” declared Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer on Sunday.
“Democrats take responsibility for our workers. We require that any corporation that takes taxpayer dollars must protect their workers’ wages and benefits—not CEO pay, stock buybacks or layoffs,” Speaker Nancy Pelosi told reporters on Monday.
What they are overlooking is this: you can’t be employed without an employer. Companies = jobs. The WSJ editorial explains it eloquently:
For their political purposes, Democrats want Americans to believe you can separate employees from employers. There’s a name for that: unemployment. If companies go broke, so do the jobs for the employees, and the paychecks that go with the jobs.
Democrats can boast all they want that they are providing unemployment benefits to these former employees, but what happens when this virus crisis passes? Where will those workers go to get their jobs, their skills, their careers back if their employers are out of business? Democrats will be able to offer them a few hundred bucks a week and maybe Medicaid health insurance.
Congratulations, workers, and welcome to years on the dole.
The slush fund accusation is an excursion into class warfare, which is just about the last thing we need right now. It also doesn’t make any sense.