Opinion: Taxpayers Subsidize Giant Corporations Every Day. It's Time To End the Practice

A greedy businessman happily looking at his money.Photo byMotortion Films via Shutterstock

Taxpayers have subsidized businesses that don’t pay their employees a living wage for years.

It’s time to tend the gravy train of free money and force businesses to pay their employees appropriately.

How are Tax Payers Subsidizing Businesses?

When companies don’t pay their employees enough to survive, they seek government assistance to bridge the gap, paid for by taxpayers.

Refusal To Pay Living Wage

Companies love this system. They can pay the bottom barrel prices for the labor they desperately need to exist while raking in record profits every quarter.

Brainwashing Public

They’ve brainwashed the public to believe it’s just by making people think those with low-wage service jobs don’t deserve a living wage.

“Get a better job!” people scream, refusing to acknowledge that these positions, though not mentally demanding, are physically taxing and take hard work.

Employees Rely on Government Programs

While the public rallies against higher wages for service workers, the workers rely on government assistance to pay their bills.

Walmart and McDonald's employees are among the top recipients of taxpayer-supported programs like Medicaid and food stamps.

So Public Ultimately Foots the Bill

These employees have full-time jobs that don’t pay them enough to live. They rely on taxpayer money to fill the gaps, meaning the public, who is so adamantly against forcing companies to pay their employees a living wage, ends up footing the bill for their survival.

On Ending Tax Payer Subsidies

Some say the government should stop supporting these workers. Certain political parties claim the government is paying too much and seeks to end these essential programs.

However, these very same people still don’t want to force companies to pay a living wage.

Thrusting Millions Into Poverty

If we did that, we’d thrust millions of people into poverty and potential homelessness. These are hard-working people, not the “users” and “layabouts” politicians target in their speeches.

Nobody working 40 hours a week should worry about poverty, homelessness, or unexpected medical expenses.

Businesses Should Pay Instead

We should, however, end government subsidies for labor. If a business needs labor, it should pay for it, not rely on the government to pay half the cost through social programs.

Any business that needs employees should pay those employees a living wage.

Poor Business Model

Some will decry this plan, saying businesses can’t afford the high price of labor.

That’s just too bad for the business. If a company can’t afford labor without taxpayer subsidies, it shouldn’t be in business. Why is it the public’s responsibility to ensure a corporation like McDonald’s can afford to operate?

Anti-Capitalism

The system is anti-capitalist when you think about it. In a truly capitalistic system, only businesses that could afford to pay a living wage would survive.

In our oligarchy, powerful businesses stay afloat and increase profitability through government funding.

Capitalism for the Poor, Socialism for the Wealthy

The actual people, though, the citizenry in which the government is supposed to serve and protect, have no such protection.

The citizens enjoy a horrifically cutthroat capitalistic system where they’re doomed to a life of poverty and hardship for one accident or misstep. In contrast, corporations enjoy subsidies, bailouts, and socialized losses.

Fix a Broken System

It’s time to fix the broken system and demand a government that works for the people, not corporations.

We must demand corporations pay a living wage so that any employee who works 40 hours per week no longer needs government assistance. We must stop socializing corporate losses and start socializing things that would benefit the populace, like medical care and disaster relief.

We can change the system if we band together and demand it.

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This article was produced and syndicated by Partners in Fire.