CEI’s Labor Policy Launch, Beer and Wine Middlemen, and Lessons from the Stimulus

CEI’s Labor Policy Launch

CEI is celebrating the launch of its new Labor Policy Project tonight with a reception featuring remarks by former Secretary of Labor Elaine L. Chao.

For media inquiries, contact Nicole Ciandella. For more information about CEI’s labor policy work, contact Labor Policy Analysts Vincent Vernuccio and Ivan Osorio.

Beer and Wine Middlemen

Beer and wine wholesalers are lobbying the House to push through H.R. 5034, which would force wine and beer producers to sell only to “middlemen” wholesalers, rather than directly to consumers.

Director of Risk and Environmental Safety Angela Logomasini slams wholesalers’ attempts to limit competition.

“Not only is this legislation bad for consumer freedom, it isn’t necessary to ‘save’ the wholesaler business. Wholesalers will not disappear without a mandated three-tier system. In fact, wholesalers do well in places like California and Washington, D.C. where there are no such mandates. Wholesalers exist because they provide a valuable service in getting products to market—but they should have to compete for their place like everyone else.”

Lessons from the Stimulus

Several Department of Energy Studies show that one reason stimulus projects have failed is that they were slowed by regulatory red tape.

Associate Fellow Ben Lieberman says that government officials should take regulatory delays in stimulus projects as a valuable lesson in economics.

“Just as stimulus spending faces a regulatory gauntlet, so does private investment. Efforts by large and small businesses to expand — the real source of an economic recovery and job growth — are hampered by the regulatory state at least as much as are the government projects highlighted in the DOE reports. Streamlining or eliminating these regulatory hurdles would do far more to help the economy than all the stimulus spending in the world.”