Lower taxes mean higher wages at Walmart.
AP Photo/Elise Amendola
Bloomberg.com had a story Thursday saying that Walmart is raising starting pay for new employees to $11 an hour and also plans to give existing employees bonuses of up to $1,000. The wage hike will cost the company $300 million. The bonus checks will cost another $400 million.
Credit for all of this goes to the new tax law according to the company. Said Walmart CEO Douglas McMillan,
Tax reform gives us the opportunity to be more competitive globally and to accelerate plans for the U.S.,”
AT&T, Wells Fargo, Boeing and others have announced bonuses or pay increases and have all cited the new tax law as the reason for doing so. We will never know the stories of countless thousands of small businesses in cities and towns all across the country that are doing similar things for their employees.
Of course this flies right in the face of the Democrats’ narrative that says that reducing tax rates helps greedy executive-suite fat-cats at the expense of “ordinary hard-working Americans.” And we must realize that the Democrats’ narrative still resonates in many quarters, even among the very workers who will be benefiting from lower taxation on a higher rate of pay.
But the truth is the truth. Millions of Americans are getting, in one fell swoop, a double raise in the form of a higher hourly wage and a reduced tax burden thereon. Hundreds of thousands of businesses will have more cash available for expansion and capital investment. If you believe in free people and free markets, these are good things.
Are these announcements by big companies like Walmart publicity stunts? Of course they are, at least partly. What sane company would pass on the opportunity to gain the positive PR attendant to doing a good thing for its employees?
But it’s more than just PR. Like AT&T and Wells Fargo and the others, Walmart is taking most of a billion dollars that they will no longer have to send to the IRS and putting it instead in the hands of its workers to spend, save or invest as they see fit.
The Left is aghast. Nancy Pelolsi has the vapors. Economists are hedging by doing their “on one hand but then on the other hand” dance. The media can’t stop telling us that the deficit is going to explode. (Something that didn’t much concern them during eight years of Obama.)
The deficit may indeed go up. Or it may not. Such predictions are notoriously inaccurate.
But forget the deficit. Deficits can also be controlled by reducing spending let’s remember.
The real questions are these:
Whose money is it?
And who will put that money to its highest use in a free-market economy – the businesses and workers who earned the money through risk-taking, enterprise and hard work? Or the bumbling, bloated, agenda-driven federal bureaucracy overseen by career politicians?
Wasn’t it the democrats and obama who wanted min wage to go to $15? Didn’t matter at whose expense. So what are the democrats griping about? Our liberal neighbors to the north found out about mandatory higher min wages and what happens when there is nothing to help businesses counter the effect on them. Rather employees found out that if they want to keep their job they had to make concessions. A popular coffee house in Ontairo had to let it’s employees know that they would no longer have PAID breaks that they enjoyed before and that they would be contributing to their healthcare plans. Employees who had been there 5 years or more would have to contribute 50%. Employees who have been there less than 5 years would have to contribute 75%. Before the mandatory pay hike, the healthcare was covered 100%. So, how did the min pay hike help? You economic majors out there…go figure that one out. Seems Trump’s ideas are more resourceful, wouldn’t you say?
Very well said Mr. Gleiser.
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The democrats have completely lost their way. They most certainly are NOT of the lineage of JFK who espoused concerning taxes…. that a “rising tide lifts ALL boats” –meaning, lowering taxes by tax cuts is GOOD for EVERY American. And ALWAYS spurs economic prosperity for us ALL.
President Trump along with conservative Republicans in Congress are indeed the party of America–WE THE PEOPLE–steering the United States back on the road and out of the ditch where the democrats had recklessly driven us.
The President’s recent massive TAX CUT legislation signed into law is just one more proof of what correct policy can do to Make America Great Again!
Go President Trump, MAGA!
I own a small business (100 employees) in Arlington. Once I know what the tax reduction will be for us, I’ll be looking to invest the money no longer being taken from us. We will invest it in: 1) Better pay for employees; 2) Expanding infrastructure and inventory selection; and 3) Hiring more workers to accommodate our growing business. However, any addition benefits to our employees will be in the form of yearly bonuses. With luck we’ll have 8 years of President Trump, but when another president comes along–a socialist Democrat or a feckless Republican–the high taxes could return. In such a case, it will be easier to end the yearly bonuses than it would be to cut wages.
Forget the deficit! And don’t fret that AT&T/Time Warner merger, or National Labor Relations Board rollbacks Wal-Mart lobbied for. Let the tanks and rocket launchers crumble Pennsylvania Avenue!