The Patriot Post® · Thursday Opinion

Best of Right Opinion

• Larry Elder: Instead of ‘Infrastructure Investment,’ How About Killing Davis-Bacon?
• Victor Davis Hanson: Will Nuclear North Korea Survive 2018?
• George Will: America Needs a Balanced-Budget Amendment More Than Ever
• Ed Feulner: A Six-Question Test for 2018, and Beyond
• Ann Coulter: Al Franken’s Touching Departure

For more of today’s columns, visit Right Opinion.

Opinion in Brief

Larry Elder: “What if, instead of spending more on infrastructure, the government began paying nearly 20 percent less for projects? And how about pushing privatization, where possible, over the inevitably more costly government spending? The Davis-Bacon Act, a Depression-era measure, was designed to thwart black workers from competing against white workers. It requires federal contractors to pay ‘prevailing union wages.’ This act sought to shut out black workers from competing for construction jobs… It is remarkable that Davis-Bacon still lives despite its racist intent and its discriminatory effect — to this day — on black workers. Passed in 1931, two Republicans teamed up to sponsor it. In a labor market dominated by exclusionary unions that demanded above-market wages, blacks, at the time, competed by working for less money than the unionists. Davis-Bacon stopped this by requiring federal contractors to pay prevailing local union wages, causing massive black unemployment. Lawmakers made no secret of the law’s goal. … Davis-Bacon adds as much as 20 percent more to the cost of any federal project. And most states have enacted local Davis-Bacon laws that similarly jack up the price of those government construction projects. This brings us to privatization. Why not encourage more projects to be built and run by the private market?”