The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) released a report yesterday showing that federal employees receive substantially more compensation than similarly skilled workers in the private sector. National media, from The New York Times to National Public Radio, reported this “news.” The CBO report was spurred in part by two years of work conducted by The Heritage Foundation and the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) on federal compensation. We have repeatedly argued that the average federal employee makes more than similar private-sector workers and that Congress can cut costs by reducing this premium. …
The NFL Players Association just came out against Indiana’s proposed right-to-work law. This is not too surprising: Even the poorest NFL player makes $390,000 a year. The average NFL player makes $1.9 million. NFL players make enough to barely notice union dues. They also have jobs. Right-to-work makes little difference to them. The same is not true for most workers in Indiana. Union dues cost the typical worker hundreds of dollars a year. For many families, that is not pocket change. Almost 300,000 unemployed Hoosiers cannot find work. A policy …
The framers of the Constitution required the President to get the consent of the Senate before appointing senior government officials. They wanted to prevent the President from appointing those who would abuse the public trust. President Obama’s purported appointment of Richard Griffin to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) yesterday illustrates the importance of this constitutional restraint. The union movement has a problem: Just one in 10 nonunion workers wants to join a union. Few workers believe that unions have much to offer, and even fewer want their company to …
President Barack Obama wants to extend the temporary payroll tax cut into 2012, and congressional Democrats and Republicans agree. They disagree over how to pay for it. Democrats propose raising taxes on the financially successful. This would discourage potential entrepreneurs from starting new enterprises—not the best idea when job creation remains stuck near record lows. Republicans propose reducing the federal workforce by 10 percent and extending the President’s federal pay freeze for another three years. The GOP approach has many merits. Unlike tax increases, less government spending does not discourage …
It is an old saying that “Businesses get the union they deserve.” Workers whose companies treat them poorly unionize; workers who are treated well do not. President Obama’s National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) wants to shorten this adage. His NLRB wants businesses to get unionized, period. This would hurt both workers and the economy. Only one in 10 nonunion workers say they want to unionize. Union membership has shrunk to just 7 percent in the private sector. It is easy to see why: In a competitive economy, unions have a …
The Grinch who stole Christmas has some competition in Washington. The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) appears determined to steal Thanksgiving from employers and employees. On Friday the NLRB announced it will vote on November 30 to revamp organizing elections to heavily favor unions. Currently, unions build support at a company for months before calling for a vote. Management often has no idea that such activity is going on. Once organizers believe they have enough support, they ask the NLRB to conduct a secret-ballot election. Typically the vote occurs five …
President Obama promised to run the most open and transparent Administration in history. However, his Department of Labor (DOL) just announced more regulations rolling back financial transparency for labor unions. Congress passed the Labor-Management Reporting and Disclosure Act (LMRDA) in 1959 following hearings documenting links between labor unions and organized crime. The act requires unions to publicly disclose how they spend their members’ money. Congress believed that this would discourage malfeasance and enable union members to hold their leaders accountable. Until recently, however, the act did little to achieve these …
Apparently unemployment is not much of a problem in the private sector. At least Senator Harry Reid (D–NV) thinks so. Debating the Senate’s proposed $35 billion bailout for state and local governments, Reid argued, “It’s very clear that private sector jobs have been doing just fine. It’s the public sector jobs where we’ve lost huge numbers, and that’s what this legislation is all about.” Senator Reid is not just mistaken; he has his facts exactly backwards. If the recession has barely touched one sector of the economy, it is …
Stand aside, citizen-protestors. The Occupy Wall Street movement is about to get professional help. New York City labor unions have decided to join the demonstrations. Members of the Service Employees International Union and the United Federation of Teachers, among other unions, will soon be marching with the protestors. Why is the union movement making common cause with disgruntled students? Because these protests are useful vehicles. Unions can use them to marshal support for special-interest policies that benefit them. Take a look at some of the protestors’ “demands”: Restoration of the …
This week, just in time for Labor Day, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) handed down several decisions that undermine workers’ rights to tell union organizers “no.” In one ruling, Specialty Healthcare and Rehabilitation Center of Mobile, the NLRB radically redefined the definition of a collective bargaining unit—the workers a union represents—to permit micro-unions. Traditionally, unions organize workers who share a community of interest. At a grocery store, for example, a collective bargaining unit would typically represent all the hourly employees. The NLRB junked that definition in favor of a …
