"It’s hard to pick from among the vacuous comments of Republican hopefuls, but I can’t let this one from Rand Paul slip by. On Sunday’s Fox News, Paul blamed income inequality on “some people working harder and selling more things. If people voluntarily buy more of your stuff, you'll have more money."
So I suppose the hedge-fund manager Steven A. Cohen raked in $2.3 billion in 2013 just because people voluntarily bought more of his stuff? Baloney. The Justice Department found insider trading at Cohen’s firm “substantial, pervasive, and on a scale without known precedent in the hedge fund industry.”
And I suppose Donald Trump made his billions because people voluntarily bought his stuff? No chance. He made wild bets and then used bankruptcy laws (crafted by corporations and financiers) to shield himself from the consequences when bets went bad.
And I suppose Rand Paul himself made it completely on his own without his father’s connections?
One of the most pernicious myths in America is you earn what you’re “worth.” Baloney. The Walmart heirs don’t do anything but speed-dial their investment advisors and they’re wealthier than the bottom 40 percent of Americans put together, while many working-class and poor Americans put in sixty hours a week and don’t get squat.
It’s about power. Fifty years ago America’s largest employer was GM and the typical GM worker earned $35 an hour (in today’s dollars) because GM workers were backed by strong unions. Today the largest employer is Walmart, whose typical worker earns $9.40 an hour because they don’t have a union behind them.
Your view?"
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