The same day a troubling national jobs report showed businesses can’t hire workers partly because politicians have risked inflation to make everyone welfare recipients in the name of “COVID relief,” Wisconsin Democrats put out a video calling for people to “show us your stimmy shimmy.” After an outcry on Twitter, the Democrat account deleted the video, but another user saved it:
Nabbed the original. Here’s what @WisDems thought was a good idea to produce. pic.twitter.com/70waDKp4ET
— Brian Onorio (@brianonorio) May 7, 2021
The video shows people dancing about getting a “stimmy,” or stimulus check, and having “$$$ in the bank” and “$$$ in the pocket.” “Thank you POTU$,” reads one caption.
Approximately 83 percent of American tax filers were sent the latest round of “stimulus” checks Congress approved after Joe Biden took office, including tens of millions who never lost jobs in the past year of rolling government lockdowns. Couples could earn as much as $160,000 per year and still get one of the deficit-funded checks that totaled up to $1,400 per person.
Nine million net jobs were lost due to COVID shutdowns, while so far 161 million Americans have gotten checks. In addition to repeatedly sending nearly everyone checks, Congress also boosted unemployment benefits so that many Americans can currently make more money not working than by going back to work.
Paying people not to work? A U of Chicago study found 42% of those on unemployment benefits receive more than they did in their prior jobs, the average unemployment recipient earns better than the equivalent of working full time at $15 an hour. https://t.co/KIj4ClQCQP
— Helen Raleigh (@HRaleighspeaks) May 7, 2021
No one should be surprised by this because why would anyone want to go back to work when they could get more from unemployment benefits? https://t.co/fYR3sRJm2o
— Helen Raleigh (@HRaleighspeaks) May 7, 2021
Studies have found that while most used some stimulus money to pay bills and maintain their pre-pandemic levels of spending, recipients are also spending a significant amount of stimulus checks on restaurant takeout, discretionary spending, paying down debt, boosting savings, and investing — not exactly items required to keep people alive. Half of those ages 24 to 35 reported on one survey that they were spending half the stimulus on the stock market.
Explosions in government spending and constant bailouts that have flooded state, local, and individual budgets with unneeded and unearned cash have brought the national debt to approximately $28 trillion, and unfunded federal liabilities (the amount Congress has promised to pay out in the future above what it has required welfare programs like Social Security to take in) to the unfathomable level of $148 trillion.
“Contrary to claims that government debt isn’t a major problem, a broad range of facts show that it can have serious negative consequences, such as lower wages, weak economic growth, increased inflation, higher taxes, reduced government benefits, or combinations of such results. These, in turn, impair people’s quality of life and can reduce their life expectancy. Some of these impacts may have already begun,” writes James Agresti for the Foundation for Economic Education.
Agresti notes that the Government Accountability Office warns that “the costs of federal borrowing will be borne by tomorrow’s workers and taxpayers,” which “may reduce or slow the growth of the living standards of future generations.” Economists also note that governments overwhelmed with debt at these levels almost always use inflation to steal from citizens more than they tend to notice when governments take that money directly through higher taxes.
Completely ignoring all of these factors, Wisconsin Democrats instead chose to celebrate the fact that Congress has encouraged people to take money from the nation’s future and lose the self-support, self-respect, and job skills that accrue from employment.
“This is so disrespectful to all the people who lost their livelihoods and their businesses to lockdowns,” noted Federalist Senior Contributor Georgi Boorman. “It’s not a jackpot at a Vegas slot machine, it’s money our great-grandchildren will be paying back.”
Source: The Federalist
