Chrysler’s Bankruptcy, Small Businesses Fight Back and New York’s War on Bottled Water
Financial analysts size up what Chrysler’s entrance into Chapter 11 bankruptcy means for customers and employees.
Small business owners band together to oppose new union organizing rules.
Gov. David Paterson on New York issues an executive order banning state purchases of bottled water.
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1. BUSINESS
Financial analysts size up what Chrysler’s entrance into Chapter 11 bankruptcy means for customers and employees.
CEI Expert Available to Comment: Special Projects Counsel Hans Bader on the political angle:
“…Obama effectively gave ownership of Chrysler to the United Auto Workers Union (which spent millions electing Obama), rather than taxpayers (who have spent billions to bail out Chrysler) or the institutions that lent money to Chrysler based on the legal right and expectation that they would receive its assets before the UAW union would. Veteran political commentator Michael Barone also calls it ‘gangster government.’ The UAW will also retain ‘lucrative’ pension and health benefits, courtesy of the taxpayer.”
2. CONGRESS
Small business owners band together to oppose new union organizing rules.
CEI Expert Available to Comment: Editorial Director Ivan Osorio on the status of negotiations on Capitol Hill:
“With Democrats just shy of the 60 votes they need to end a filibuster, the fate of the so-called Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) remains in the balance in the Senate. While the current version of the bill seems unlikely to pass, EFCA supporters are likely to try alternative versions. One such option is EFCA without its controversial card check provision, which would allow unions to circumvent the secret ballot in organizing elections, and has been the bill’s most controversial provision to date.”
3. ENVIRONMENT
Gov. David Paterson on New York issues an executive order banning state purchases of bottled water.
CEI Expert Available to Comment: Director of Risk and Environmental Policy Angela Logomasini on Paterson’s misguided move:
“New York lawmakers are promising more than they can deliver. At least some of the water found in government agencies is delivered in large five-gallon plastic bottles, few of which ever enter the landfill. These bottles are reused on average, 35 to 50 times or more. Once these bottles are retired, they are recycled. They actually represent a private-sector environmental/recycling success story. Banning them in government agencies won’t save landfill space.”
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