Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., will soon introduce legislation that would require large employers like Amazon, Walmart and McDonald’s to fully cover the cost of food stamps, public housing, Medicaid and other federal assistance received by their employees. The goal, he says, is to force corporations to pay a living wage and curb roughly $150 billion in taxpayer dollars that currently go to funding federal assistance programs for low-wage workers each year.

The bill, which Sanders plans to introduce in the Senate on Sept. 5, would impose a 100 percent tax on government benefits received by workers at companies with 500 or more employees. For example, if an Amazon employee receives $300 in food stamps, Amazon would be taxed $300.

Packages move along a conveyor belt at the Amazon.com Inc. fulfillment center in Robbinsville, New Jersey on June 7. MUST CREDIT: Bloomberg photo by Bess Adler. Humberto Manzano Jr. delivers an arriving pallet of goods at an Amazon.com fulfillment center in Phoenix. Amazon employs more than 575,000 workers nationwide. Associated Press/Ross D. Franklin

“At a time of massive wealth and income inequality, the gap between the very rich and everyone else continues to grow wider,” Sanders said.

Labor groups say that gap is particularly pronounced at the nation’s largest – and most profitable – companies, including Walmart, which has roughly 2.2 million workers, and Amazon, which employs more than 575,000.

Public records obtained by the New Food Economy, a non-profit news organization, show that thousands of Amazon employees rely on the government’s Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program to make ends meet. As many as one in three Amazon employees in Arizona – and about 1 in 10 in Pennsylvania and Ohio – receive food stamps, according to an April report by the New Food Economy, based in New York.

Amazon spokeswoman Melanie Etches said in a statement the figures were “misleading because they include people who only worked for Amazon for a short period of time and/or who chose to work part-time.” “We have hundreds of full-time roles available; however, some prefer part-time for the flexibility or other personal reasons,” she said.

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