January 11, 2014

How to Do the War on Poverty Right

By Bruce Walker
Fifty years ago, LBJ launched a "War on Poverty."  It has failed horribly.  But fifty years before LBJ, on January 5, 1914, another man launched his own "War on Poverty" that was a dazzling success.  That was the day Henry Ford announced that he would pay his workers $5 per day, twice the average factory wages at the time, and that the workday would be reduced to eight hours.  Ford also offered workers profit-sharing plans.  Ford was a hardheaded and self-made businessman who understood that paying high wages to productive workers was good business.  Turnover at his plants dropped dramatically.  Workers were able to afford his Model T, the cheapest and best car in the world at the time, and quickly they became solid middle-class homeowners. Excellent wages encouraged the best workers to stay with the best companies, and it also influenced his competitors, who also had to pay good wages to their workers in order to...(Read Full Article)