The Patriot Post® · Reviving Big Labor and Other Dem Manipulation

Upon the good news of last Friday’s jobs report, Joe Biden shuffled out to claim credit for the fact that “our economy created 6.6 million jobs” in his first year as president. We’ve said it before but it bears repeating: Our economy has rebounded despite Biden’s efforts, and largely thanks to GOP governors of red states.

We’re not being reflexively partisan to say that. Biden’s $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan came on top of already-extravagant “COVID relief” spending and is largely responsible for the inflation we’re all suffering through right now. His unnecessary extension of enhanced unemployment benefits did little but extend unemployment. That has distorted the jobs market, leading to supply chain issues and more inflation. Much of that inflation has come because businesses are raising wages to compete for workers. Rising prices come to pay for those wages.

And Biden’s not done. Three stories of his market manipulation and central planning are in the news again today.

First, Biden is reportedly seeking a 4.6% raise for federal workers in his upcoming budget proposal. Presidential budgets stand zero chance of becoming law, but that doesn’t mean his pitch won’t influence congressional Democrats. And while the private sector is forecast to raise wages only 3.4% this year, hourly wages were up 5.7% over the last 12 months. That’s the effect of the aforementioned wage pressure initiated by the federal government.

Democrats couldn’t pass a $15 minimum wage, so they enacted one through the backdoor of market manipulation. Higher government wages will contribute to that upward pressure.

Second, speaking of minimum wage, Biden signed Executive Order 13658 on April 27, 2021, raising the minimum wage for federal contractors to $15 an hour. California is the only state (DC notwithstanding) with a minimum wage that high. So it’s little surprise that five states banded together to sue Biden over the order.

Last but not least, the Biden administration is playing to its union base because Big Labor isn’t nearly so big as it used to be and Democrats need unions and their dollars.

Vice President Kamala Harris is leading the White House Task Force on Worker Organizing and Empowerment, which hopes to resuscitate failing unions. According to political analyst Paul Bedard, “In sharing the keys to the federal government with the AFL-CIO and other labor groups, a new report from Harris and Labor Secretary Marty Walsh said that boosting union membership to about 70 million, or more than half of the nation’s total, full-time, adult workforce, is the goal.”

He’s extrapolating that based on the task force’s claim that if every worker who wanted union representation had it, “union membership would be four to five times higher than it is right now.”

Bedard notes, “Union membership is about 14 million today. Increasing that five times would boost membership to about 71 million, more than half of the full-time workforce of 130 million and nearly half of all 157 million working adults.”

Democrats always accuse Republicans of “turning back the clock,” but when was the last time unions accounted for half the American labor force? 100 years ago? We’re kidding — the real answer is never. At the height of unionization in America in the 1950s, membership among workers was roughly 35%. And Harris wants 50%?

Her task force’s report even acknowledges this, complaining that “only 10.3% of the workforce was represented by a union, down from more than 30% in the 1950s.”

That’s not a bug, it’s a feature.

It’s not that the workers today don’t need protection from poor conditions or bad treatment, or that unions didn’t achieve things for workers that most Americans agree are good things. But unions have become little more than another constituency arm of the Democrat Party, and most of the big unions’ work is political fundraising for Democrats. No wonder Harris wants more members — it means a lot more confiscated dues going to Democrat campaign coffers.

Now, don’t get us wrong — better worker protections and higher wages are great; every worker wants to be paid more. But the market, not the central planners in Washington, should be the driving force behind these things. And as long as DC Democrats are manipulating the market, there will be challenges and obstacles for the economy to overcome.