Artist's rendering
During the 2012 presidential race, which was not all that long ago and something you may still remember, wealthy Florida real estate person David Siegel
got a bit of notoriety for sending his Westgate Resorts employees a maudlin form letter noting that while he couldn't "tell you whom to vote for," their jobs would be "endanger"-ed if the cruel President Barack Obama was not unseated by fellow wealthy person Mitt Romney. The ostensible cause was that his fragile empire could not possibly stand another four years of the sort of deeply onerous taxes that Siegel imagined Obama had been imposing, and that if he was going to be taxed anymore he was going to close his company and go be rich on a Caribbean beach.
Alas, his efforts were in vain. Barack Obama did indeed win re-election, ushering in the dark and communist-ish hellscape Siegel had envisioned.
Just over two years after penning that company-wide email, Siegel informed Westgate employees that instead of layoffs, he would boost their minimum wage to $10 per hour beginning in 2015.
In fact, according to Siegel, 2014 was a banner year. “We’re experiencing the best year in our history and I wanted to do something to show my gratitude for the employees who make that possible,” Siegel said in announcing the wage hike. He also recently told the Orlando Business Journal that “things have never been better.” [...]
Despite writing in 2012 that any tax increases on the wealthy would mean job losses — “Rather than grow this company I will be forced to cut back,” he said at the time — Siegel has been extraordinarily successful growing Westgate in the two years since taxes were modestly increased on the wealthy.
What is this? A wealthy person has remained wealthy and continued to grow his business despite modest steps to return our national tax structure to what it was before George W. Bush set oars to water? Imagine that.
One might ask how such an apparently savvy and successful job-creator as Mr. Timeshare here could have so badly bungled his business predictions as to predict imminent business doom, only to find themselves reaping so much profit that even Mr. Timeshare feels obliged to give his lowest-paid employees a modest raise. I blame the drink. It is well known that most wealthy people spend most of their time drinking; Let us graciously presume that his strong support for Willard Romney (and his previous strong support for George W. Bush) were mere whiskey-fueled rants.