Ivan Osorio is editorial director and a labor policy analyst at the Competitive Enterprise Institute.
What a difference. This week’s enactment of a right to work law by Michigan lawmakers comes only three years after the 2009 government-directed bankruptcies of General Motors and Chrysler seemed to cement the United Auto Workers union (UAW) as kings of Detroit. The Obama administration, eager to please a key union constituency, moved the UAW […]
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is touting the recent passage of his “compromise” bill reauthorizing the Federal Aviation Administration, the agency that oversees U.S. air transport. Unfortunately for airline workers, Congress missed a rare opportunity to enact needed reforms to America’s labor laws. After months of heated debate, leaders finally reached a deal late last month […]
Unions have been disappointed by the Obama administration’s inability to move their agenda forward. But they finally won a victory last week. This is bad news for America’s transport sector, not to mention travelers and businesses of all sizes that rely on rail and air shipping, because it could cause major disruptions to travel and […]
Imagine voting in a presidential election where one candidate can campaign for a year and the other is only told he is running a week before Election Day. As absurd as that sounds, that is precisely the choice that President Obama’s National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) is trying to impose on American workers. The NLRB […]
Unions thrive on workplace conflict. The AFL-CIO, for example, sponsors a “Bad Boss Contest,” which awards the employee who submits the best story about a horrible boss a “seven-night vacation escape” from his or her workplace travails. But aggressive union tactics are no laughing matter, as a recently unveiled playbook distributed by one of America’s […]
Are unions desperate? When it comes to reviving their fortunes in the private sector, it certainly seems that way. Union leaders, unable to reverse decades of continued decline in private sector membership, are seeking political solutions to their ills — specifically, changes to labor law that would favor unionization. They pinned their hopes on the […]
How far is the Obama administration willing to go to promote organized labor’s agenda? The National Labor Relations Board’s (NLRB) recent decisions to pursue legal action against a private company and some state governments provide an answer to that question. On April 20, NLRB Acting Genral Counsel Lafe Solomon (who is recess-appointed and has not been […]
The upcoming 50th anniversary of Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chairman Newton Minow’s “vast wasteland” speech has prompted some in the media to revisit the speech to assess its relevance — or lack thereof — to today’s media landscape. Minow would go on to dubious fame as the namesake of the shipwrecked boat in the 1960s […]
As many of us rush to finish filling out our tax returns, we should remember that what we pay out in taxes — and how government spends that money — is only part of what government costs us. The cost burden imposed by regulations lies beyond the federal budget, extending the government’s reach through mandates […]
Changing election rules to favor one side is something we usually associate with dictatorships. Yet a U.S. federal agency did just that recently, as part of the Obama administration’s efforts to impose policy changes favorable to organized labor without the consent of Congress. And, as in a dictatorship, the result is very difficult to undo. […]
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