Letter to the editor: Biden must address income inequality

Income and wealth inequality is at its highest point since the Great Depression, and we all know how that turned out. Adjusted for inflation, the average worker in America made roughly $43 a week less in 2023 than they made 50 years ago, all the while becoming dramatically more productive. In 1978 CEOs at major American corporations realized some 30 times more compensation than the nation’s private-sector workers. By 2022, that gap went from 30 times to nearly 400 times what workers made. This inequality is killing our middle class and our country.

Since our do-nothing Congress will not do its job, we must look to President Biden. His administration has already required the payment of prevailing local wages to construction workers on all federal projects. Let’s ask him to go a step further with an executive order that denies federal contracts to any company that pay CEOs outrageous compensation packages, that outsource jobs overseas and that deny workers good benefits and a prevailing wage.

He must stop this rigged economy that is serving the super rich at the expense of workers. Too many of us are struggling to pay the bills and are living paycheck to paycheck. Please write to Biden requesting an executive order for our economy’s viability.

Julia Bojalad

North Huntingdon