Living off Biden’s freebies is not the American way

OPINION:

America was built by the “working stiff,” ordinary men and women doing ordinary jobs to earn the means to put a roof over their heads and food on the table. Now a sizable proportion of those individuals are stiffing work — choosing to live off the labors of others. That’s not the American way. Ensuring the future hinges on rejecting easy freebies and recovering respect for the nation’s work ethic.

The Biden administration proudly claims to have driven down the post-pandemic unemployment rate to admirable lows — 3.7% in October. Unmentioned, though, is the proportion of Americans who have simply quit working: The labor force participation rate measured a feeble 62.2% last month.

While 10.7 million jobs remain unfilled across the nation, reports the Labor Department, more than 7 million working-age men remain neither employed nor looking for work. American Enterprise Institute scholar Nicholas Eberstadt has labeled them “a nation of quitters.” Americans with their noses to the grindstone can only wonder: How do their idle neighbors manage to get by without a paycheck?

Part of the answer is government largesse, which is meant to keep the wolf from the door for the downtrodden. Sadly, handouts also disincentivize work. With the unbridled distribution of $2.5 trillion in borrowed public funds in 2020 and 2021, the national personal savings rate doubled as Americans collected more COVID-19 relief money than they could spend. Whether one is poor or wealthy, free money is hard to resist.

Even with the pandemic fading, millions have chosen not to return to the office — the so-called “great resignation.” Americans are watching the phenomenon in real time Following Elon Musk’s takeover of Twitter and the layoff of half the social media giant’s workforce, more than a thousand employees have refused their new boss’s requirement to work “extremely hardcore.” Instead, they’re quitting en masse.

In San Francisco where Twitter’s headquarters is, the city offers guaranteed income to certain protected classes of individuals. Among them are musicians, artists and writers, and expecting and post-birth mothers. Recently added to the list are transgender people, who can apply for stipends of $1,200 per month. Could Twitter employees who have flown the coop soon be next in line?

Then there are others who don’t require a paycheck because they make their living off the venerable five-fingered discount. Target has reported that smash-and-grab practitioners have relieved the company of $600 million worth of goods already this year. The so-called shrink in inventory, combined with sales figures dinged by rising inflation, have prompted the big-box retailer to pencil in cost reductions totaling $3 billion over the next three years.

Other businesses suffer in a similar fashion. The Retail Industry Leaders Association and Buy Safe America Coalition reported that as much as $68.9 billion worth of products were stolen from retailers nationwide in 2019.

It’s an axiom of human nature that ambition plus labor equals the satisfaction of a life well lived. There are always the infirm of mind or body and they are deserving of charity. The able-bodied who have grown accustomed to stiffing work, though, do not. Living off freebies is not the American way.