Where I Stand — Brian Greenspun: President vs. politics

Friday, March 10, 2000 | 9:55 a.m.

Brian Greenspun is editor of the Las Vegas Sun.

A MINIMUM WAGE with a maximum of aggravation.

I don't know exactly how long this latest effort to pass a minimum wage increase has been kicking around the U.S. Congress, but it is safe to say that if Congress spent as much time with other bills as it has spent delaying and playing with the $1 an hour increase for the least paid of American workers, then we would be plagued by bad legislation no more. The Capitol building and all within it would grind to a halt.

The Republican majority in the House of Representatives finally relented to reason and good sense Thursday and passed the increase in the minimum wage. It wasn't easy. According to the usual anonymous source, the conservative members of the GOP gave in out of respect for Speaker Dennis Hastert and, truth be told, out of concern for their own re-election efforts.

Until yesterday, they were content to stand on principle, or whatever it is in their credo that says working Americans should be fortunate to have a job that pays them a farthing north of $10,000 for a full year's work. Such a position is understandable in light of the fact that the members of Congress -- who are so dead set against any increase -- make something close to 15 times that yearly amount.

What the GOP hard-liners did do to make the vote for what one congressman described as a "Democrat bill with Democrat amendments pushed forward by the (Republican) leadership" more palatable was combine it in a measure that would cut taxes by $122 billion over ten years. President Clinton, questioning why the lawmakers couldn't just send a clean bill that he could sign, threatened to veto the combined effort because it is too narrow a benefit for the wealthiest in our country and a threat to the Social Security needs of my generation as we near retirement age.

The president, of course, is right. Not in his opposition to a reduction in the estate tax rates, but in his opposition to the unnecessary coupling of the tax decrease with the long overdue and much-needed increase in the minimum wage. Let me explain and let me confess a bias.

If I can manage to avoid what are some very tempting get-richer-quick schemes and some compelling but unnecessary purchases during the next part of my life, I may be among a very fortunate group of Americans who will leave this world unable to take a comfortable savings account along. Unless I can figure out how to take it with me, it is my intention to leave much of that amount to my heirs and certain charities that are important to me. In short, how and to whom I leave whatever estate I can accumulate is the culmination of the American Dream and I hope to be able to participate.

Many decades ago, in an effort to break up the enormous wealth that was being handed down from generation to generation through trusts and other methods that allowed long dead industrialists to continue to call the economic shots in America, Congress imposed an estate tax. The presumption was that recirculating a portion of those hard-earned dollars would give succeeding generations a shot at the brass ring and would encourage otherwise unproductive heirs to get the lead out. Like much of what happens in this country, it seemed like a good idea at the time. Today, however, the tax rates on larger estates is what many would call confiscatory with well over half of a person's estate being carted away by the Internal Revenue Service. Those who are in a position to complain do so, and not without good cause.

For what is America about if not the desire to work and earn so that your children and theirs will have a better life? Assuming most people agree, then the question begs an answer. Why would we allow a governmental policy that encourages some of the most productive members of society to stop producing, because they know that out of every dollar earned the bulk of it will go to Uncle Sam? I favor some kind of estate tax because I believe the early thinking had merit. But lately, and especially given the incredible estates that will be built up during the next 50 years of the "information age," the amounts that government extracts are confiscatory and a huge disincentive to productivity.

Having said all that, the fact remains that any change in the estate tax rate should be voted up or down on the merits, after due consideration of all points of view. Clearly, the wealthiest in our society will benefit, but this is an issue where good policy should win the day. Explained properly, most people should agree.

But there is no way an issue like this should be coupled with the debate over the minimum wage, and it amazes me that the GOP leadership would allow it to happen. Even wealthy people -- excuse me, especially those who have tasted a good life -- understand how important it is to reward those Americans who work hard all of their lives with a livable wage. Not that $6.15 an hour is livable in today's world, but it is far better than $5.15, isn't it?

What makes the the Republican majority in Congress think that the American people will see a connection between raising the minimum wage by a dollar and returning the better part of $122 billion of them to the wealthiest in our society. It doesn't compute and it does a disservice to those who believe in an estate tax reduction because it is good policy. What we are witnessing is bad politics and I don't think the voters will reward the brilliant strategists in the GOP who decided to link these two issues for political reasons.

President Clinton is requesting that the Republicans in Congress send him a clean minimum wage bill that he can sign. Both sides win when they recognize the value of those Americans who work very hard in low-paying jobs and the GOP wins by taking away a strong Democratic issue for the fall elections. A clean bill gives everyone in Congress the chance to take the credit.

By encouraging the legislators to do what is right and good, the president is acting, well, presidential. By refusing to take the politics out of people's chances to earn a decent wage, those in Congress are acting, well, ugly and mean.

So, what else is new?

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