Warren Comments On The Economy
There are certain constants in life: gravity pulls down, fire burns, and Elizabeth Warren never met a bad idea she didn’t want to enshrine in federal law. The latest entry in her ever-expanding file of legislative nonsense? A bill to ban employers from running credit checks on job applicants.
Yes, you read that right — she wants to make it illegal for a business to know if the person they’re about to hand the company checkbook to has a history of dodging bills, maxing out cards, and living in a perpetual state of financial chaos.
Senator Warren, joined by Representative Steve Cohen, insists that denying someone a job based on their credit history “makes no sense.” Actually, it makes a lot of sense. An applicant’s credit record is a snapshot of how they manage responsibility, obligations, and long-term commitments.
If you can’t manage your own finances, why should an employer believe you’ll handle theirs competently? If I were hiring someone to work with money, sensitive information, or high-value assets, you’d better believe I’d want to know if they’re swimming in financial quicksand. That isn’t “discrimination.” It’s common sense.
Of course, Warren’s bill would amend the Fair Credit Reporting Act to forbid employers from requesting or using such information. It would also handcuff credit reporting agencies from providing it, even if businesses wanted it. And naturally, she couldn’t resist playing her favorite rhetorical card: identity politics.
According to her office, credit checks “disproportionately disqualify people of color and women” from positions. Which, stripped of the polite phrasing, is just another way of saying, “People of color can’t manage credit as well as white applicants.” That’s the implication. And it’s every bit as condescending as it sounds.
It’s the same tired refrain we hear every time Democrats want to tinker with standards. Whether it’s voter ID, standardized tests, or now financial history, the underlying message is always the same: minorities aren’t capable of meeting the bar. But somehow, these same “incapable” people are perfectly capable of navigating the tax code, applying for government benefits, or — conveniently — pulling a lever in a voting booth.
The kicker here is constitutional. Congress has no authority to dictate how private businesses evaluate prospective employees. If an employer decides that credit history matters to them, that should be their prerogative. No one is being forced to apply for that job. This is yet another case of Washington sticking its nose where it doesn’t belong, micromanaging private decisions under the guise of “fairness.”
Thankfully, this bill has virtually no chance of clearing a Republican Senate, and it shouldn’t. The labor market doesn’t need another layer of regulatory sludge, and America doesn’t need more lectures from a senator whose economic literacy rivals that of a turnip.