Yes, super-rich NFL football teams, which sop up billions of dollars in subsidies from us taxpayers, pay peanuts to their highly-publicized cheerleading squads. Widely assumed to be a glamour job, it’s actually a poverty job that requires long hours of arduous practice, involves frequent travel (at their own expense) for media appearances and charity events, and subjects the women to abusive treatment by supervisors.
Members of the Oakland Raiders’ squad calculate that their pay works out to less than $5 an hour, while the Cincinnati Bengals’ cheerleaders (who bear the burden of being called “Ben-Gals”) are paid about $2.85 an hour. Astonishingly, though, a recent ruling by the U.S. Labor Department says that this does not violate federal law. Why? Because the macho sports industry got its cheerleaders categorized as “seasonal amusement” employees – a loophole that exempts them from our national pay rules.
The Powers That Be are trying to transform our Land of Opportunity into their low-wage, plutocratic province. From farm workers to cheerleaders, we’re all in this together – and it’s time for us to get together to stop the plutocrats.
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This has been reposted from Jim Hightower’s website.
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