Category Archives: jobs

The Party of Expansionist, Acquisitive Government

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That’s what we can see made plain in the incoming Congress’ House of Representatives.  Congresswoman Bonnie Watson Coleman (D, NJ) had this on her Progressive-Democratic Party’s plans:

There are dozens of measures…that have been languishing with Republicans at the helm for years, and I expect to see many of them finally come to the floor under Democratic leadership[.]

Plans like rolling back the just enacted tax cuts and preventing the individual income tax cuts from becoming permanent.  Because the Progressive-Democrats know more about how to spend our money than we do.

Plans like Medicare for all, free education for all—paid for by raising those taxes.  So much for “free.”

Guaranteed jobs, especially, “green” jobs—at the Progressive-Democrat’s mandated minimum wage because, like all workers, “green” workers are just too stupid to be trusted with freely negotiating their own compensation package.  And hired by whom?  Not so much a free economy employer; “greenery” isn’t competitive, so the Progressive-Democrats intend to centrally plan our energy economy and require greenery along with subsidizing it.  That can be expected to work as well as the Progressive-Democrats’ centrally planned health economy.

Oh, and they want to deepen the central planning on that: as part of their “Medicare for all” bit, they intend for Uncle Sugar to be sole dispenser of and sole payer for each citizen’s (and illegal alien’s) health care.

Block border security by blocking any wall and by eliminating Immigration and Customs Enforcement.  And hamstringing US Customs & Border Protection generally.

It’s going to be an ugly, wasted two years with no serious legislation coming out of the House—only the Party’s nakedly socialist claptrap.  Socialist and Government-run because, these worthies insist, the average American is inadequate to the task of his democratic duty.

Another Outcome of Supreme Court’s Abuse of the Takings Clause

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Recall the Takings Clause of our 5th Amendment:

nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

Now recall three critical Takings cases decided by the Supreme Court.  Berman v Parker was a 1954 case in which the Supremes explicitly rewrote that clause to say for public purpose, not use.  Hawaii Housing Authority v Midkiff was a 1984 case in which the Supremes ruled that it was perfectly fine for a State government to take private property away from a private enterprise and give it to private citizens who leased the property from the business.  Kelo v City of New London was a 2005 case in which the Supremes said it was jake for a State government to seize a private citizen’s property and give it to a private business for that business’ purposes.

That last shameful ruling led to a large number of States passing their own laws or State Constitutional amendments severely restricting the conditions under which eminent domain can be used.  The Federal government’s power as distorted by the Supremes in that trio of cases, however, remains the law.

This brings me to New York and New York City and amazon.com’s HQ2 move into the city.

In their bid for Amazon.com Inc’s second headquarters, New York City and state officials dangled prime real estate at the tech giant and offered to use eminent domain to scoop up any necessary properties for a campus, newly disclosed documents revealed Monday night.

These worthies planned the theft confiscation eminent domain seizures in four areas: Midtown West, lower Manhattan, along the Brooklyn waterfront, and Long Island City.

Such an offer wouldn’t have been possible except in the aftermath of Berman, Midkiff, and Kelo.  This is the extent of the destruction of private property the Supremes have wrought.

Union to Management:

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“Nice little company you have here.  Be too bad if something was to happen to it.”

That’s what the railroad union EVG said to Germany’s major railroad company, Deutsche Bahn, last Monday as it took its workers off the line, shutting it down, during the rush hour period—a timing intended to inflict maximum damage to DB.  It’s not just the railroad this union extortion strike affected, either.

The strikes also caused major disruption on the roads. Germany’s most populous state, and one of the worst affected by the strike, North Rhine-Westphalia, saw a combined 450 kilometers (280 miles) of tailbacks [backed up traffic from traffic jams], according to regional broadcaster WDR.

The union’s beef?  It wants higher pay for its workers, which is not, in principle, a bad thing.

However.

DB management had offered the union’s workers a pay raise of 5.1% in two increments and a “signing bonus” of €500 ($569).  The union, though, is demanding a 7.5% pay raise and the option for individual workers to decline that in favor of more time off or shorter hours.  Never mind the labor scheduling mess and associated increased cost that would create.

This comes, too, in the face of the fact that Germany’s inflation rate this year works out to just a skosh over 1.9%; it was roughly 1.65% each of the prior two years, essentially flat in 2014-2015, since 1995 it’s been above 2.5% exactly once (~3.2% in 2007, just before the Panic of 2008); and DB having raised its ticket rates this year by 1.9% just to cover the current year’s inflation.

The workers are being offered a handsome pay increment in real terms.  The union is demanding more just because it can.

Nice little company….

Second Thoughts?

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The New York City city council has decided to hold a series of hearings on the just concluded Amazon HQ2 deal cut with the city.  The council’s beef is the secretive nature of the negotiations between amazon.com and the folks purporting to represent the city.

Deputy Mayor Alicia Glen, Economic Development Corp President James Patchett, and Amazon executives have been invited to the hearings, which will take place during the next few months, City Council Speaker Corey Johnson’s office said Thursday.

There’s nothing wrong with the negotiations themselves being done behind closed doors; that’s the only place “frank and open” discussions can occur.

However.

Now that the negotiations are concluded, and before the city council has to vote on accepting or rejecting the deal—especially over what the negotiated deal wants to commit the city to—it’s time for the city council and its members’ constituents to hear the full details of the arrangement.

The council’s hearings should be open to the public and moved to a larger venue if needs be.  If the constituents don’t like what they hear, the deal should be voted down.  Or maybe the deal should be put to a referendum.

If amazon.com walks away from that, that would demonstrate the uselessness of the deal to the city’s residents.

A Thought on Amazon’s Choices

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Amazon.com has made its selection (-s, plural as it turns out) for its alternate corporate headquarters: Arlington County, VA’s Crystal City and New York’s Long Island City, with a booby consolation prize—or a scrap bone—tossed to Nashville, TN.

I have a couple of thoughts about this.

San Antonio, in Texas, had misgivings and declined to play Amazon’s game.

“Blindly giving away the farm isn’t our style,” wrote San Antonio officials in an open letter to Mr Bezos.

Others openly groveled and kissed the ground on which Amazon officials walked when those worthies deigned visit.

In Los Angeles, Amazon executives notified officials on a Tuesday they would be visiting the following Monday. Local officials had to juggle a major clean-technology conference scheduled for that day because Amazon executives insisted they couldn’t change their plans. The message was clear: Amazon had to take priority.

That should have been a crystalline hint, and Los Angeles’ pseudo-leadership should have told Amazon to take a hike.  Instead, they bent over their desks and….

Crystal City and Long Island City—and Virginia and New York at large—will pay a heavy price for their kowtowing.  Nashville may get off more lightly, but I’m not holding my breath.

San Antonio made out like a bandit (so did Dallas, TX, one of the non-selected finalists; although they will take a while to realize it).