CEI Awards Pro-Worker Legislators

As we did last Congress, the Competitive Enterprise Institute has produced our Labor and Employment Policy Scorecard for this 113th Congress on our labor website, WorkplaceChoice.org.

CEI experts Aloysius Hogan, Trey Kovacs, and Iain Murray score each congressional vote on a key pro-worker issue. Issues include increasing employment, bettering incentives for workers, augmenting workers’ income growth, and improving worker freedom.

CEI senior fellow and labor expert Aloysius Hogan stated, “Congratulations to all the Champions of the Worker who are leading the way on labor and employment policies to improve job growth, augment worker income, and benefit worker freedom. These stalwarts resisted all of the accounting gimmickry, unfunded governmental handouts that burden future workers, and additional federal mandates that are siren songs pulling the ship of state in the wrong direction.”

An average of over 65% of Americans polled feel the country is currently headed in the wrong direction. Poor labor and employment policies are part of the problem.

In the House of Representatives, 28 current Members earned 100% pro-worker scores as of Labor Day 2014. Every Member with a 100% pro-worker score is designated a “Champion of the Worker.” 

  1. Bradley Byrne (R) AL
  2. Trent Franks (R) AZ
  3. Paul Gosar (R) AZ
  4. Matt Salmon (R) AZ
  5. David Schweikert (R) AZ
  6. John Campbell (R) CA
  7. Tom McClintock (R) CA
  8. Gary Miller (R) CA
  9. Curt Clawson (R) FL
  10. Ron DeSantis (R) FL
  11. Ted Yoho (R) FL
  12. Raul Labrador (R) ID
  13. Marlin Stutzman (R) IN
  14. Mike Pompeo (R) KS
  15. Andy Harris (R) MD
  16. Justin Amash (R) MI
  17. Alan Nunnelee (R) MS
  18. Steve Chabot (R) OH
  19. Jim Jordan (R) OH
  20. Reid Ribble (R) WI
  21. Trey Gowdy (R) SC
  22. Mick Mulvaney (R) SC
  23. Scott DesJarlais (R) TN
  24. John Carter (R) TX
  25. Pete Olson (R) TX
  26. Randy Weber (R) TX
  27. James Sensenbrenner (R) WI
  28. Cynthia Lummis (R) WY.

The Competitive Enterprise Institute rated the following 15 key votes in the 113th Congress:

Second Session (2014)

  1. Roll Call Vote # 414: On passage of the bill to utilize risky accounting gimmickry nicknamed “pension smoothing,” rejected as a sham method of paying for a prolonged extension of jobless benefits, to fund federal transportation programs.
  2. Roll Call Vote # 295: On agreeing to an amendment to the 2015 Transportation, Housing and Urban Development Appropriations Act to prohibit the use of funds to pay a federal employee for time used for union activity.
  3. Roll Call Vote # 235: On agreeing to an amendment to the 2015 National Defense Authorization Act to create a moratorium within the Department of Defense on the insourcing of previously contracted activities.

First Session (2013)

  1. Roll Call Vote # 567: On passage of a bill to prohibit the Secretary of Labor from prescribing any the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA) regulation that would be overlapping and duplicative of Securities and Exchange Commission regulation, until after the SEC regulates.
  2. Roll Call Vote # 565: On agreeing to an amendment to authorize the Department of Labor to regulate under ERISA in an area where the SEC is already regulating, where ethics mandates are already in place. Experts argue such a rule may harm retirement business and low-income investors.
  3. Roll Call Vote # 441: On agreeing to the amendment to use federal employment impact analyses often claiming job creation when massive job losses result. Government analyses omit cascading cross-industry effects and include destroying existing jobs to create hoped-for regulatory compliance jobs.
  4. Roll Call Vote # 436: On passage of a bill to limit federal employee bonuses during sequestration, to provide federal agencies with additional tools to use when senior managers behave badly, and to allow individual citizens to protect themselves by recording conversations with federal officials.
  5. Roll Call Vote # 407: On agreeing to the amendment to prevent denial of security clearances to Department of Defense employees due to a “furlough caused by sequestration” without affording the same to DoD contractors, thus creating a disadvantage for contractors vis-à-vis government employees.
  6. Roll Call Vote # 191: On agreeing to the amendment to prohibit funds made available by the Act to be used to implement, administer, or enforce the prevailing wage requirements in the Davis-Bacon Act which has artificially inflated costs of federal construction and maintenance projects.
  7. Roll Call Vote # 137: On passage of a bill to amend the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 to allow private employers to provide compensatory time off to private employees for employment for which overtime compensation is required. “Comp” time already has worked in the public sector for decades.
  8. Roll Call Vote # 135: On agreeing to the amendment to obtain a Government Accountability Office report to Congress on the usage of compensatory time allowed under the Act and which details any complaints filed or any enforcement actions taken for alleged violations of the Act.
  9. Roll Call Vote # 101: On passage of a bill to prohibit the National Labor Relations Board from taking any action requiring a quorum until a quorum shall have been confirmed by the Senate, the Supreme Court decides the constitutionality of Board appointments, or Congress adjourns sine die.
  10. Roll Call Vote # 73: On agreeing to the substitute amendment for Workforce Investment Act reauthorization that adds six programs, eliminates just one program (not funded for a decade), and fails to streamline bureaucracy that affords less than one in five the training needed to fill 3.6 million open jobs.
  11. Roll Call Vote # 44: On passage of a bill to eliminate the 2013 statutory pay adjustment for federal employees. The average pay of federal employees is significantly higher than the average pay of non-federal workers who, with their taxes, pay the salaries of the government employees.
  12. Roll Call Vote # 225: On agreeing to the amendment to allow Department of Defense competition. President Obama stated “[T]axpayers may receive more value for their dollars if non-inherently-governmental activities that can be provided commercially are subject to the forces of competition.”

On September 16, CEI will host a ceremony to recognize pro-worker Representatives for advancing sensible labor and employment policies. Every “Champion of the Worker” is invited to receive their framed awards and to take photographs with the CEI policy experts. An award is pictured above.

To see the full list of how all the U.S. Representatives scored on the Congressional Labor Scorecard, visit WorkplaceChoice.org/scorecard.