Friday, October 26, 2012

The Threats Are The Rite-Hite

Add Rite-Hite Safety Systems' CEO Mike White to the list of business owners threatening their employees to vote Romney or else.

The list of corporate CEOs and owners who have tried scaring their employees into voting for Mitt Romney got a bit longer this week thanks to Milwaukee businessman Mike White.

White, the owner of the industrial equipment firm Rite-Hite, sent his 1,400 employees an email this week warning them that they needed to “understand the personal consequences to them of having our tax rates increase dramatically if President Obama is re-elected,” according to the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, which was sent a copy of the correspondence. The email goes on to warn that Rite-Hite would consider dropping its contribution to the workers’ retirement plan, blaming tax hikes that White says are on the way if Obama wins a second term, and that workers will lose their health care.

But don't take my word for it.  Take Mike White's.

“The tax rate we pay is not 17%, as Warren Buffett would have you believe; with state taxes it is roughly 45%. President Obama has announced that our planned tax rate would increase to roughly 65%, reducing our after tax income by 36% and dramatically reducing, if not eliminating, your and my RSP contributions.”

As a result, White said the company’s profits would not be reinvested. Instead, he wrote, “the money will be sent into the abyss that is Washington, D.C. So, on top of the burden of having your personal taxes increase dramatically, which they will, your RSP contributions and healthy retirement are also at risk, all for the sake of maintaining an over-sized government that borrows 42% of every dollar it spends.”

P.S.:  White is a big Republican donor.  How would you feel if your boss sent you an e-mail threatening you with the loss of retirement and health insurance if the wrong guy wins?  And remember, this was an e-mail he sent out to all employees publicly.  This wasn't under the radar.

But don't you dare call it class warfare, right?

Oh, and P.P.S...it looks like Mike White broke Wisconsin law.

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