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Republicans Declare War

The congressional Republicans have declared war on working middle class families.  It is extremely irresponsible in the midst of an economic crisis.  Yesterday, congressional Republicans wanted to cut wages and benefits of the United Auto Workers - American workers.  A strange and troubling demand particularly when our economy needs people to have money to buy stuff.

Whenever the Democrats complained about fairness of capital gain tax cuts or huge income tax cuts for the richest people, Republicans accused the Democrats of class warfare.  But this was just a canard or smoke screen offered up by Republicans.  The concept of “class warfare” is so 1980s but it reared its ugly head yesterday and was instigated by Republicans

Senator Mitch McConnell (R-KY), Senate minority leader, called for

an alternative that would reduce the wages and benefits of the Big Three automakers to bring them in line with those paid by Japanese carmakers Nissan, Toyota and Honda.

That is right, Republicans wanted to lower wages and benefits for American workers.  Did the Republicans insist on lowering salaries and compensation for CEOs and other senior executives of financial institutions?  No, in fact, the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 does not require senior executive officers to take a salary cut.  But, Republicans want middle class workers to take a cut.

Through the closing days of the Presidential Election and even after, Republicans were saying that it would not be good for our troubled economy if President-elect Obama and the Democrats abolished the “Bush tax cuts” – the tax cuts that went to the wealthiest Americans.  This is a reasonable concern during an economic crisis and President-elect Obama said that he would not pursue his tax plan until the economy is stabilized.  Republicans do not share the same concern about the economy when it comes to middle class workers.  Our economy needs people to buy stuff and lowering workers wages and benefits seems to contradict the Republicans’ “concern” for our economy.

This is not a regional issue – non-union south versus union north.  The Republicans have made it a class issue.  They want to lower wages for American workers.  It is reasonable to believe that workers in the South would love to have comparable wages and benefits of their northern counterparts.  But Republicans want to bring middle class workers down instead of lifting them up or even helping them (i.e. single-payer health care).  Republicans and their benefactors cannot afford to have this perceived wage disparity between workers.  It may cause labor unrest.

Republicans chose to make an issue that could have been resolved through negotiations between UAW and the automakers into a deal-breaker.  For what, because the Republicans resented the fact that American workers collectively negotiated good wages and benefits from their employers.  Republicans showed their true war colors by trying to inject themselves into matters that were better left to negotiations between unions and management.

Active UAW workers make approximately $55/hour wages and benefits while workers for Toyota and Honda make approximately $45/hour wages and benefits.  The actual cash wages is the same if not more at Honda and Toyota.  The gap is a result of more generous benefits such as health insurance.

If the Republicans are so concerned about wage disparities then maybe health care reform should be a priority for Republicans.  True health care reform is not something Republicans are interested in or will support.  Instead, Republicans want to focus on lowering wages and benefits for American workers.

The bigger problem for the Big 3 or Detroit 3 is that people are not buying American cars.  This is going to require a comprehensive legislative strategy that needs to address the long-term viability of a huge portion of our manufacturing base.  Republicans, instead of providing constructive proposals and addressing the real problems, targeted the American workers by demanding lower wages and benefits.

We should be focusing on stabilizing our economy and not perpetuating class warfare.