Bill Maher Wants to Make America Shop Again on ‘Real Time’ (Video)

“New Rules” segment contrasted Trump’s obsession with coal mining jobs to the nation’s disappearing brick and mortar retail sector

Bill Maher used the “New Rules” segment of Friday’s episode of HBO’s “Real Time” to address a slow-building economic crisia: The decline in brick-and-mortar shopping is causing retail powerhouses to close and eliminating thousands of jobs in the process.

For Father’s Day, said Maher, “Do the right thing and go out to the mall and get dad a polyester shirt with tin cuff links and a nylon tie in a plastic box. He’ll never wear it because he’s not the door man at a Sicilian whorehouse. But there is a greater cause to be considered: Stores are going extinct. And they’re taking millions of jobs with them.”

“Americans no longer shop ’til they drop,” he continued. “They click ’til they’re sick.”

Maher compared the decline in retail jobs and the lack of discussion of the problem to Trump’s well-known focus on coal industry jobs. “We must put our miners back to work,” he said. “No, the jobs we’re losing aren’t in coal — they’re at Kohl’s.”

Maher lamented the death of mall culture staples like elderly exercise, bored teenagers, cheap Christian-rock CDs for when he needs to make people leave his parties. “And mostly,” he concluded, “where will all the laid-off miners go to work?”

Watch the whole thing above.

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