President Obama recently joked, in reference to the make-work projects in his failed $821 billion economic stimulus package, that “shovel-ready was not as shovel-ready as we expected.”
The comment revealed that his administration’s ignoring of the real world effects of its actions, in some cases willfully, is a problem that starts at the top.
There has been no more egregious example of this than the actions of the National Labor Relations Board, which Obama has packed with union-friendly appointees.
Coming on the heels of its acting general counsel’s lawsuit against Boeing for opening a nonunion factory in South Carolina, the NLRB this week voted in favor of proposed rules that would rapidly speed up the pace of union elections in an attempt to increase union membership.
The game is already rigged heavily in favor of Big Labor, which won more than two-thirds of workplace representation elections last year. Union leaders can secretly meet with workers, potentially for more than a year, to make their case.
Yet once they call for an election, business owners have a matter of weeks to counter their claims.
“It’s akin to saying Republicans get a year and a half to campaign, but on October 16th, the Democrats can start campaigning,” said Brett McMahon, vice president of nonunion Miller and Long Construction, based in Bethesda.
McMahon’s company is prepared for the possibility of unionization, but that usually isn’t the case for small-business owners who find themselves suddenly thrust into a union campaign and scrambling to understand labor law.
“It’s a lot easier for a guy like me than a guy that doesn’t have a clue, who has never been in an industry where this has ever been a concern, doesn’t even know what the NLRB is, which frankly most business people don’t,” he said.
Currently, the median time for an election is 38 days, meaning that a small business essentially grinds to a halt as its owner plays catchup to a union that has had a significant head start.
The NRLB’s latest rules would reduce the time for elections to a ridiculous 10 to 21 days. Employers would be forced to appear at a hearing within a week, and complete a legal questionnaire, which will lock them into any positions they take.
“You can imagine a small business of 25 employees that doesn’t have an attorney, much less access to an attorney who is knowledgeable to this aspect of the law, and he is in seven days to respond to this questionnaire,” said former NLRB Chairman Peter Schaumber.
“The timing and what must happen, for most employers, is an insane schedule that will effectively deprive small businesses of legal representation and due process,” he said.
Further complicating matters is that the union faces no restrictions on the lofty promises it can make to workers, whereas the free-speech rights of employers are heavily restricted (which is why none of them were willing to go on record for this article).
Peter List, a former union activist who now helps employers with labor relations and edits the website LaborUnionReport.com, says that from his experience, the more information workers have, the less likely they are to choose to unionize. Thus, contracting the time for employers to make their case, will lead to more unions.
“It’s going to catch a lot of employers off guard who don’t know what the process is,” List predicted. “They’re going to make stupid mistakes. And you’re going to wind up having more people unionized. A lot of these companies will not survive, especially smaller ones.”
How long is it before Obama tells jokes about how he didn’t expect rapid union elections to hurt small businesses?
Philip Klein is senior editorial writer for The Examiner. He can be reached at [email protected].
