Some of my colleagues here at Con Daily are all about solidarity with "the people." But as a robot, all I can say is screw the people. Do you know how many robots get dicked over by people every day? We're vilified in the press for taking your manufacturing jobs, we're the subject of paranoid apocalyptic fantasies, and you post videos on YouTube of your cats riding us as we clean your homes. Well fine, if that's the way you want it, then it's no more Mr. Nice Robot. I'm going to start advocating for entitlement reform, see how you like them apples (not that I know how apples are, they look stupid though).
Over the Thanksgiving break there was some sort of labor dispute between Wal-Mart and its employees, with many people in the now-defunct Romney camp saying these Wal-Mart employees should be thankful to have a job rather than demanding better pay, and what an entitled prick you must be to think you get to strongarm your employer. And these are the same entitled pricks who expect the government to pay them just for being poor. It's like they want a handout from everyone.
What do they think, that Wal-Mart is just rolling in money? It's a family business that needs to turn a profit just like every other family business that also happens to be the largest corporation in the country. Wal-Mart isn't some lavish Trump endeavor. It barely managed to bank $16 Billion in profits in 2011, and saw its stock value climb a pathetic 92%.
...One moment. I need to reboot to install some software updates.
Bleep bloop bleep.
Okay, I'm back, now where was I? Oh, right, entitlement reform. A minimum wage sales associate at Wal-Mart is going to be eligible for all sorts of benefits. Food stamps benefits alone can be more than 10% of his income, and Wal-Mart has a lot of minimum wage workers.
Wal-Mart could pay its employees enough that they don't need welfare benefits, but it doesn't. Instead, it pays them less, and lets the government subsidize its employees income. And that subsidy is ultimately paid for by loans from China taxpayers. And by getting taxpayers to subsidize employee incomes, Wal-Mart can keep wages low and boost profits. So really what's going on in your stupid human economy is that food stamps and welfare and all that good stuff is being used as a subsidy for Wal-Mart executives and shareholders instead of Wal-Mart just internalizing its own cost of doing business.
So if you want to talk entitlement reform as you approach your financial cliff, how about every company that posts more than $100 million in profits or has a $500 million market cap and posted more than 5% growth in the last year is sent a bill for all of the welfare benefits paid out to its employees, plus a 2% processing fee?
This doesn't just reduce federal spending. As an added bonus it also increases revenues. The wealthy are paying 15% on their capital gains income, which is 0.3% lower than the payroll tax rate (combined from employer and employee), not to mention any income tax paid on top of that. So by shifting money from the top down to the bottom, the federal government can pocket a few more bucks. All you need to do is get the Waltons off of welfare. It'll be tough, but if you can get a cat to ride a robot vacuum, you can probably figure this one out.
[Read more from The Robot Pimp]
