Edit Article

Democratic socialist Senator Bernie Sanders continued his proud tradition of fighting The Man recently, with a doomed proposal for a 32-hour workweek.

Sanders introduced the legislation with California Representative Mark Takano, who had previously put forward the bill in 2021. According to Sanders, “A 32-hour workweek is not a radical idea. What’s radical is that, despite an explosion in technology and productivity over the last 50 years, millions of workers are working longer hours for lower wages while nearly $80 trillion in wealth has been redistributed from the bottom 90 percent to the top 1 percent.”

Under the plan, federal overtime pay requirements would start once employees worked past 32 hours, rather than the current 40-hour rule. The new rule would gradually go into effect over time, rather than being implemented immediately.

Plenty of Americans can relate to feeling overworked, stressed, and as though everyday life has gotten prohibitively expensive. Sanders’s preferred solutions, though, do nothing to address any broader structural problems in the American economy. Instead of doing any reflection on why certain men are falling behind in career attainment, or exploring ways we could revitalize different American industries and provide more varied paths to success, he prefers to rant about billionaires while offering minimum wage hikes and a European workweek as magic fixes.

Sanders has previously spoken about the depressing effect open borders would have on American wages, calling it a “Koch brothers proposal” that would make the country poorer. While he made those comments in 2015, he has never repudiated them, and he has spoken about the need for Democrats to reconnect with its historic working-class base following President Donald J. Trump’s ascendance. Still, Sanders has repeatedly condemned Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and called for stripping funding away from the agency, so it is doubtful that his stated opposition to open borders has any practical value.

While Sanders presidential dreams have passed, he has a dedicated younger fanbase, as well as acolytes among the next generation of Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) politicians such as New York Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani. These kinds of politicians may find further reach if people increasingly find that a successful middle-class lifestyle is too difficult to attain. Unfortunately, their socialist gimmicks will simply feed a sense of resentment and entitlement, rather than solving the problem.