Ben ‘Never Trump’ Shapiro Launches Elitist Attack Against the American Working Class

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Aug 14, 2019

Neoconservative commentator Ben Shapiro showed his true colors yet again while ranting on his show today, launching a vicious attack on the working class of America.

Shapiro blamed ordinary Americans for their economic strife, levying the blame upon anyone with more than one job who isn’t making ends meet.

“Well, the fact is, if you had to work more than one job to have a roof over your head or food on the table, you probably shouldn’t have taken the job that’s not paying you enough. That’d be a ‘you’ problem,” Shapiro said, lecturing American workers who are struggling from his privileged bubble.

Shapiro dubiously claimed that virtually no Americans have to work two jobs to support themselves and their families because he doesn’t know any in his gated community.

“So, this notion that there are just tons and tons of people who are working in multiple jobs, it is not really true. It is not actually the reality,” Shapiro said.

“It is also this bizarre idiocy that you can dictate to the economy what the economy ought to do,” Shapiro added, in an indirect attack on President Donald Trump’s ‘America First’ trade policies.

“The economy fights back because it turns out the aggregate knowledge of the market economy knows more than you do. I know, shocking,” Shapiro said, reciting his Koch-bought talking points on the market economy.

His full rant can be seen here:

Shapiro relies on census data to come to his arrogant conclusions, but analysis from Forbes shows that the census seriously downplays the number of individuals with multiple jobs for a variety of reasons.

Accurately knowing the number of people working jobs on the side is difficult. If you talk about the gig economy, for example, the government has three completely different estimates of what it includes. (There isn’t even a single definition of unemployment.)

Unemployment numbers are based on the monthly Current Population Survey (CPS) administered by the Census Bureau. The Bureau of Labor Statistics then analyzes the data and publishes the results.

According to the BLS, the number of people holding down multiple jobs has dropped since the mid-1990s and is now at 4.9%…

According to the BLS explanation of unemployment statistics, the CPS depends on in-person or telephone interviews of people over a period of time. To include someone, it must be possible to repeatedly find the person.

If people are working long hours at multiple jobs and spending time traveling between them and home, successfully scheduling an in-person interview is less likely. Poor people also move more frequently than those with higher incomes, so there is an issue of finding an accurate current address. A greater use of mobile phones rather than landlines and the lack of directories of mobile phone numbers increases the difficulty of reaching specific people.

When a significant group likely to work multiple jobs is also harder to reach, there is a good chance of under representation in the survey.

Other potential errors from the government data include people’s unwillingness to admit that they work more than one job out of shame or because they are getting paid under the table at a particular job to avoid the tax burden. Other workers may not even realize that they work more than one job.

Shapiro’s attacks on the working class contradict Trump’s rhetoric of supporting the American worker and using government policy to create better jobs with higher wages. The Iraq War cheerleader said infamously that he would never vote for Trump in 2016, and continues to undermine Trump’s agenda at every turn now that he is President.