Photo: Jens Kalaene/picture alliance (Getty Images)
Bernie Sanders, the nefarious propagandist for the Soviet Union, has done it again. This time, the Senator from Vermont has introduced a bill that would drastically reduce Americans’ working hours while maintaining their current levels of income. The legislation cites concerns about new forms of automation currently sweeping the country (i.e., AI) as the impetus for the bill.
Sanders’s new Thirty-Two-Hour Workweek Act—which could just as easily be called the Three-Day Weekend Act—would create a four-day workweek in the U.S., while mandating new overtime pay minimums to ensure that companies are adequately covering workers’ cost of living. In fact, the proposed law would bar employers from paying employees less than they are currently being paid, despite the reduction in working hours.
“Today,
American
workers
are
over
400
percent
more
productive
than
they
were
in
the
1940s.
And
yet,
millions
of
Americans
are
working
longer
hours
for
lower
wages,”
Sanders
said,
in
a
statement
posted
to
his
website.
“That
has
got
to
change.
The
financial
gains
from
the
major
advancements
in
artificial
intelligence,
automation,
and
new
technology
must
benefit
the
working
class,
not
just
corporate
CEOs
and
wealthy
stockholders
on
Wall
Street.”
Concerns about the impact of new forms of automation on workers has been swirling over the past year, as advances in generative AI have threatened the livelihoods of workers in various industries. Policymakers have paid lip service to concerns about job displacement but haven’t done much about it.
You can imagine how well Sanders’s bill has gone over in our nation’s capital, where corporate cash-flows are the fuel behind all policy decisions. At a U.S. Senate hearing on the bill, legislators made it clear that they just couldn’t abide any sort of legislation that would make Americans’ lives marginally easier. While smiling as if talking to someone of markedly low IQ, our government’s representatives gave Sanders various reasons for why letting Americans work less and enjoy their lives more was a terrible idea.
“A 32-hour work week would be catastrophic,” Senator Bill Cassidy (R-Louisiana) lamented in his response to Sanders’ bill. “Government should not be in the business of undermining an employer’s ability to keep their doors open with unreasonable and perhaps unconstitutional mandates.”
The Sanders bill notes that other countries—like France, Norway, and Denmark—already have substantially shorter working hours and are still, somehow, able to stave off national economic collapse. The bill is backed by most of America’s major labor unions, including the AFL-CIO.
If you want to call your Senator and beg them for a three-day weekend, you can consult the Congressional phone number index here.
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