According to Yahoo! news:
He is one of Hollywood’s best-compensated actors, but matinee idol Ben Affleck (news) came to the US Congress Thursday to lobby for higher pay for some of America’s lowest-paid workers.
Affleck, who earns millions per screen appearance, appeared alongside Massachusetts Senator Ted Kennedy to urge lawmakers to increase the federal minimum wage from its current five dollars and 15 cents per hour to seven dollars per hour.
Apparently, the pressure was getting to be too much, and Affleck had to open his mouth to let a little pressure out.
Instead of just talking the talk, Affleck could choose to spend his own damn money, of which there is no shortage from my vantage point but about which his fleet of accountants are undoubtedly concerned, to open a series of fast food restaurants and discount groceries wherein he could somehow pay workers $7.00 an hour and still keep in business. That would probably put some of his accountants in the morgue with heart failure, because they know (even if they don’t communicate this with their client) that higher labor costs and higher employment tend to work against each other, much like higher labor costs and affordable prices.
Instead of risking his own “earned” capital, Affleck wants to sacrifice that of real entrepreneurs. He chooses to “give at the office” by making other people and corporations pick up the tab for his community ideals, much like people who want to take care of the poor but don’t volunteer or donate because they already paid taxes but think the government could do more.
If the country were filled with people like you, Mr. Affleck and like-minded, we’d have a world….. well, much like the screwed-up one we have now.
