A Republican Look at Economic Equality - By the Numbers

Economic inequality is a front and center issue as mid-term election campaigns begin in earnest and as the Senate gets ready to debate raising the federal minimum wage.  Republicans continue to address the issue in their own way:

1. Republican Party Chairman in Pennsylvania, Rob Gleason, told the Philadelphia Daily News that members of Congress have a "tough job", where they "don't make a lot of money."
2. Representative Phil Gingrey (R-Georgia) complained last year that he could be making big money as a lobbyist but instead he was "stuck" on Capitol Hill being paid a paltry salary.
3. In 2011, Denny Rehberg (R) then a U.S. Representative from Montana told his constituents that he was "struggling like everyone else."  At the time, Mr. Rehberg had a net worth of $56 million.
4. Representative Sean Duffy (R-Wisconsin) has complained about how he "struggles" to pay his bills and has to drive "a used minivan."
5. Representative Steve Southerland II (R-Florida) says his congressional salary is "not so much."
6. Marco Rubio (R-Florida) who opposes raising the federal minimum wage says that "Raising the minimum wage may poll well, but having a job that pays $10 an hour is not the American dream." 
7. Thom Tillis, (R-North Carolina), who is challenging Kay Hagan (D) for her Senate seat, has been quoted as saying that complaints from people on public assistance after Republicans in his state voted to cut social service programs was nothing but "whining coming from losers."
8. Representative Jack Kingston (R-Georgia), who has entered the Republican primary race for the U.S. Senate recently said he had asked the Secretary of Agriculture about the school lunch program.  "Why don't we have the kids pay a dime, pay a nickel to instill in them that there is, in fact, no such thing as a free lunch?  Or maybe sweep the floor of the cafeteria."
9. And finally, we have Arthur Laffer, a conservative economist who first gained national prominence as a member of Ronald Reagans's Economic Policy Advisory Board and who now serves as a non-staff adviser to the Heritage Foundation.  Mr. Laffer managed to offend both the economically disadvantaged and minorities when he called the federal minimum wage the "black teenage unemployment act."

what eye thynk:   My answer to #s 1,2,3,4, and 5 -  Members of Congress have a base salary of $174,000 a year plus benefits.  The Speaker, Majority and Minority leaders and committee chairman earn more.  The average American salary is $51,000 per year.  Please explain to me again who you feel is underpaid and struggling.

#6:  Mr. Rubio is right, a $10/hour job is not going to earn anyone the classic American dream, but it looks like a God-send to the worker who is currently subsisting on $7.25/hour.

#7:  Members of Congress are paid 3 1/2 times what the average American makes.  So maybe, the complaints coming from Congress should be disregarded as nothing but "whining coming from 'winners'?" 

#8:  Next Mr. Kingston will be calling this a job training program and bragging how he is singlehandedly tackling the national unemployment problem.

And finally, #9 - 84% of those working for minimum wage are over 20 and 47% are over 30, not teenagers.  57% of minimum wage workers are white.  47% work full time and still have incomes so low they are eligible for food stamps and other social services.  If raising the minimum wage high enough that these same workers no longer need government paid social services, wouldn't that end up reducing the cost of government social programs--a plan that Republicans seem to advocate?

Republicans still seem to have a lot of work to do when it comes to relating to the average American income and the average American worker.   I advocate a year of being forced to live on the federal minimum wage--even a $10/hour minimum wage--as a cure for their chronic Mitt Romney-itis.  

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After watching tonight's evening news, I have to add this addendum:  16% of Americans now live in poverty while just over 50% of the members of our current U.S. Congress are millionaires.  This percentage includes both Republicans and Democrats.  While it must be difficult for ANYONE who has risen that high economically to truly understand what life is like for the rest of us, it appears that Democrats are the only ones willing to address the chasm.