| Problem is that the extreme rich (like Thiel) are the ones who are benefiting from the current situation, and deregulation/reduced taxation will just amplify the problem. The core cause being that individual humans are much more productive now. We just don't need as many people working. >They want the dignity of meaningful reasonably-paying work, not income redistribution. About the only way to accomplish reasonably-paying work is to legislate it. WalMart employees make so little a substantial fraction (possibly 15% in one state) are on food stamps. [1] Minimum wage needs to be livable. But as you push up minimum wage a lot of employers will cut back on how many people they hire. They certainly won't rehire the 5M+ people who have lost manufacturing jobs due to outsourcing and automation: Even the manufacturing jobs that are returning to the US are only hiring 1/10 or fewer the number of workers, and those need to be experts and managing robots. So if you have people who want jobs (and not, for instance, a guaranteed income), the government is going to need to be the employer of last resort. And I don't see Trump creating a New Deal. The laughable situation is that Trump is known most for cheating companies and workers for his own benefit. He's in this for his ego and for selfish gains. Looking at the evidence, at best one can hope that Trump will break the country so badly that something better will rise from the ashes. And it's immoral to push for such a disaster for someone like Thiel who isn't likely to be one of the ones who suffer from the disaster. The ends don't justify the means. [1] http://www.slate.com/articles/business/moneybox/2014/04/walm... [2] http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/07/world-wi... |