thetruthaboutefca.com | The Truth About The Employee Free Choice Act & Card Check

It would be nice if card check would just go away completely. It would be nice for employers trying to plan whether to hire new employees. It would be nice for employees who would like to keep their rights in the workplace. It would be nice for all of us to be able to focus on real efforts to improve the business climate.

Alas, no. Card check keeps popping up in news stories:

• The Republican American notes “Big Labor’s “card-check” bill still threatens to raise labor costs while reducing productivity and the quality of their products and services.”
• Hot Air: Maybe he wants the Card Check curtains!
• How Washington Will Mess with Your Money in 2010

And so it goes.

A couple items offer a look at card check and the employee Free Choice Act in historical perspective.

First, Paul Moreno, chair of constitutional chair at Hillsdale College writes that the party in power has a history of job-killing policies and points directly to EFCA:

Democrats want to force employers to bargain with unions chosen by a minority of their workers by altering National Mediation Board rules. And they are trying to make it easier for union organizers to win elections by “card-check” legislation, which would also impose compulsory federal arbitration if unions cannot negotiate a contract with employers.

Meanwhile, the well-respected pollster Stuart Rothenberg looks at a lesson from political history:

Yes, we have seen this before. After the 1994 elections, GOP leaders interpreted the results as an invitation – even a demand by most Americans – to change the country fundamentally by cutting government.

Of course, that wasn’t the case any more than last year’s presidential and Congressional elections were a mandate for a public insurance option in health care reform or a cap-and-trade bill or the enactment of the Employee Free Choice Act.

We’d warn that those who do not pay attention to history are doomed to repeat it, but that seems to be precisely the goal of EFCA’s proponents.

The Heritage Foundation has released a new document arguing, in part, that uncertainty about the future of business conditions is causing firms to delay or forego hiring of working Americans.

Interesting conclusion:

While layoffs have increased, the larger factor increasing unemployment has been businesses cutting back on investment and entrepreneurs starting fewer companies. Consequently they have created fewer jobs. Increased federal spending will not spur the private-sector investment and risk-taking necessary to create jobs and reduce unemployment. Congress should instead reduce government spending to free up funds for private investment while committing to not passing any measures — such as card-check, cap and trade, or the health care mandates — that would make creating new jobs more expensive.

Many in the construction field are suffering greatly right now, and many employers are forced to reduce hours or cut back on employment.

These policy suggestions, particularly the suggestions of what not to do, certainly sound like the best bets for a healthy economy with job growth.

You know, there are some very specific scripts for union officials hoping to squeak the anti-democratic, job-killing bill known euphemistically as the Employee Free Choice Act. And then there’s Guy LePage, who seems to be freelancing his advocacy of the bill in a letter to the editor.

LePage starts off with a whopper, writing “First, Employee Free Choice Act, is just that, a choice to have an election or have the card check by the employees, it’s not the choice of the union or management.”

Uhh, wrong. Once cards representing more than 50 percent of a bargaining unit are collected (even if the employees signing the card thought they would get an election) the National Labor Relations Board will declare the union up and running and shall not direct an election. Check out our full analysis of this oft-repeated myth here.

Now, we understand why union officials would like to skate on the edges of truth here — they’re pushing something that doesn’t sit well with the American public. But one thing that doesn’t sit well with the public is blaming the victim.

So it’s truly odd that LePage turns to that technique, when he writes of abused union members: “I would say that it’s the fault of any member who lets their union leaders continue in that position when they aren’t doing the job they were elected to do.”

Perhaps we should get a vote on whether that’s the kind of attitude American workers are looking for. Oh, wait, votes aren’t popular with the pro-EFCA crowd.

The House Committee on Education and Labor Republicans are pointing to this piece by The Spectator’s Philip Klein and conclude:

It sure seems convenient for union leadership to have friends on the inside who can make their wishes come true without bothering to get the approval of Congress or the American people. Unfortunately, this backdoor to enacting

Virginia is nearly the definition of a political “swing state.” If you don’t believe us, just check out the truthiness of Wikipedia. It has two Democratic Senators and, until, November, a Democratic Governor. But it’s a business-friendly state, too, and has been recognized as the best state in the union for business by CNBC.

So what should it tell political watchers that a swing state elected its new governor in large part on his opposition to policy proposals like card check (via the misnamed Employee Free Choice Act)? There’s no doubt that Governor-elect Bob McDonnell made card check a key of his campaign.

And now the state’s recently elected Attorney General hints that he still views opposition to card check as a political winner. The Washington Times reports:

In the Republican state senator’s acceptance speech after winning the election in November, he promised to fight for Virginians