Thread by @Noahpinion

Today's @bopinion post is about Bernie Sanders' "Stop BEZOS Act", and why it's a misguided idea.

bloomberg.com/view/articles/…

The idea is to tax companies for 100% of the food stamps, housing vouchers, school lunches and Medicaid their employees receive, IF those employees are paid less than $15/hr.

seattletimes.com/business/sande…

First, let's think about the actual effects this policy would have.

It would incentivize companies to shift from workers who need lots of govt. benefits (for example, single parents and the poor and elderly) to those who don't (i.e. middle-class teenagers).

Second, it would encourage employees to avoid claiming govt. benefits, out of fear that their employers would find out about it, would discriminated against them, and would get away with discriminating against them.

Third, in some extreme cases it might even make it economical for companies to *cut* wages.

The best outcome, of course - assuming you don't believe a national $15 minimum wage is bad - would be that the bill would simply prompt every employer to shift to a $15 minimum wage.

But Bernie has already proposed a $15 minimum wage...so why the Stop BEZOS Act?

Answer: It's grandstanding.

Er...public relations.

It's an attempt to take advantage of the growing backlash against big tech companies, of which Amazon is now the biggest and most scary and visible.

But this public relations effort has another downside, besides the potential for bad incentives.

It shifts Bernie's stance from democratic socialism to corporatism.

@ryanlcooper had a good post explaining the downsides of that shift.

theweek.com/articles/79350…

I'm not as down on corporatism as Ryan is - I think the corporate welfare state has its place too.

But I don't like seeing the govt. welfare state and the corporate welfare state pitted against each other like this.

Food stamps are not corporate subsidies.

(end)