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How to Raise All Worker Wages
With Labor Day approaching, it is a suitable time to examine which public policies promote economic growth that leads to job creation and wage increases.
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Judge: NLRB Acting as “Litigation Arm” of SEIU
A federal judge in Pittsburgh has reprimanded the National Labor Relations Board for its heavy-handed and questionable treatment of University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC) in…
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Taxpayers to Subsidize “Ministry of Truthiness”
The Washington Free Beacon reports: The federal government is spending nearly $1 million to create an online database that will track “misinformation” and…
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Obama “Fair Pay and Safe Workplaces” Executive Order Will Punish Firms in Pro-Worker States
Earlier, we discussed President Obama’s recent Executive Order 13,673, which “will allow trial lawyers to extort larger settlements from companies, and enable bureaucratic agencies to extract …
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CEI’s Battered Business Bureau: The Week in Regulation
The Federal Register burst past the 50,000-page mark with Friday’s 878-page effort, which also contained 21 final regulations and four “significant” documents.
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Better Wages and Lower Cost of Living in California Depend on Better Understanding of Economics
A San Francisco teacher’s union is threatening a strike because proposed wage increases won’t be sufficient to keep up with the skyrocketing cost of living.
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Cops to Destroy Rare Wine Collection in Pennsylvania
In the fifth century BCE, famous Greek tragedian Euripides supposedly said, “where this no wine there is no love.” This certainly holds true in present day…
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Eric Holder Avenges Investor Fraud by Taking from Defrauded Investors
“Bank of America failed to make accurate and complete disclosure to investors and its illegal conduct kept investors in the dark,” declared a government official…
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Many Unions Put Politics over Representation of Their Members
A few recent stories have shown how unions often value partisan political activities over fair representation of their members.
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Duplicative New Affirmative-Action Rule Drives Up Taxpayer Costs and Restricts Competition
Does it make sense to require a park campground operator that has a few hundred employees at 120 different locations to come up with 120…
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Newsweek’s Cover Story on Internet Gambling Plays Fast and Loose with Facts
Newsweek’s recent cover article on online gambling, “How Washington Opened the Floodgates to Online Poker, Dealing Parents a Bad Hand,” by Leah McGrath Goodman,…
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Voter Ignorance and Political Reform
If you’re a voter in Los Angeles, you just may wind up with an unexpected windfall the next time you cast your ballot. The Los…
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The Not-So-Free Market at Work
In the mail, I recently received a brochure from a firm called Solar Solution LLC, claiming to be the District of Columbia’s #1 solar installer. Included…
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The Impending BitLicense and Premature Regulations
Last month, the New York State Department of Financial Services (NYDFS) announced its proposed regulations for businesses engaged in “Virtual Currency Business Activity.”The Department defines these businesses…
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New RegData Site Makes it Easier to Track Regulation
About three years ago, our friends at the Mercatus Center launched a website called RegData that compiles a searchable database on many facets of…
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Red Tapeworm 2014: Are Environmental Protection Agency Regulations Declining? Don’t Bet on It
This is Part 26 of a series taking a walk through some sections of Ten Thousand Commandments: An Annual Snapshot of the Federal…
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CEI’s Battered Business Bureau: The Week in Regulation
75 new regulations, from tax delinquents to spectrum auctions.
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Red Tapeworm 2014: The Government Accountability Office Reports More Regulations in Obama Era
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Executive Order Pressures Employers to Capitulate to Baseless Demands and Meritless Claims
A July 31 executive order from President Obama, E.O. 13,673, will make it very costly for employers to challenge dubious allegations of wrongdoing against them,…
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Union President Threatens Opponents of Common Core with Violence
When unions get involved in political debates, it gets ugly fast. For example, the SEIU is known to bus hundreds of protesters to private residences…
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Honeybee Population in Decline—Or Not?
If you read the news about honeybee survival, it’s all very confusing. Some sources sound the alarm by pointing out that the number of honeybee…
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Michael Grunwald’s High-Speed Rail Fantasies
Perhaps the one thing Time magazine's Michael Grunwald loves more than drone assassinations of American citizens and dissident journalists is heavily subsidized passenger rail. This is not the…
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The Ex-Im Bank’s Unilateral Disarmament Fallacy
One of the weakest arguments against free trade is the "unilateral disarmament" fallacy--that a country should refuse to liberalize its trade policies until other countries…
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Red Tapeworm 2014: Tell Us — Which Regulations Hurt Your Business as You Grow?
This is Part 24 of a series taking a walk through some sections of Ten Thousand Commandments: An Annual Snapshot of the Federal…
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Due Process Eroded by Bills like CASA That Let Agencies Keep Fines They Impose
Due process is being eroded by recent bills that would authorize agencies to impose massive fines on regulated industries, and then keep those fines for…
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Celebrate National Employee Freedom Week
National Employee Freedom Week, which started August 10 and runs until August 16, is a countrywide effort by 70 groups in 41 states that's goal…
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CEI’s Battered Business Bureau: The Week in Regulation
Despite another 47 proposed regulations and 80 final regulations last week, 2014 remains on pace to have the smallest number of new regulations of any…
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The Case for Closing the Export-Import Bank
Over at American Banker’s BankThink blog, I have a piece making the case for closing the Export-Import Bank, mostly on corruption grounds: The…
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Red Tapeworm 2014: Small Businesses Beaten Down by Recordbreaking Federal Regulations
This is Part 23 of a series taking a walk through some sections of Ten Thousand Commandments: An Annual Snapshot of the Federal…
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Uber and Regulation: Pro-Business Is Not Pro-Market
“Republicans love Uber. Young urban voters love Uber. And Republicans hope that means young voters can learn to love the GOP.” That was the opening…
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Homecare Workers Freed from Big Labor’s Greed
Homecare workers in three states have finally been liberated from something they should never have experienced in the first place: paying dues to government unions…
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Red Tapeworm 2014: Completed Economically Significant Rules at Record Levels
This is Part 21 of a series taking a walk through some sections of Ten Thousand Commandments: An Annual Snapshot of the Federal…
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Public Still Favors Transportation User Fees over Tax Increases
Voters in Missouri yesterday rejected a proposed constitutional amendment that would have imposed a 0.75 percent sales tax to fund transportation, with nearly 60 percent opposing a…
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The Let Me Google That for You Act
When it comes to government transparency, more is better. As a general principle, the government should make public as many of its documents as possible…
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Jefferson Federation of Teachers Proposes Union-Friendly Contract
In the past two years, the Jefferson Federation of Teachers (JFT) and Jefferson Parish public school system have tried, unsuccessfully, to come to terms on…
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Red Tapeworm 2014: Big Dollar Federal Regulations in the Pipeline Highest under Obama
This is Part 21 of a series taking a walk through some sections of Ten Thousand Commandments: An Annual Snapshot of the Federal…
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CEI’s Battered Business Bureau: The Week in Regulation
Ninety-eight new regulations, from Moroccan blueberries to home furnaces.
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NLRB McDonald’s Decision Hurts Small Businesses, Diminishes Opportunities for Everyday Americans
The NLRB’s General Counsel Richard F. Griffin Jr. found merit in 43 of 181 unfair labor practice complaints made against McDonald’s in the last 20…
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Wisconsin Supreme Court Upholds Gov. Scott Walker’s Collective Bargaining Reform
Since 2011, Governor Scott Walker’s signature public-sector collective bargaining reform has withstood venomous union protests at the state capitol, fleeing state legislators, and sparked a…
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GMO Row Comes to Kansas Congressional Race
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New Study Estimates around $70 billion in Financial Regulatory Costs
Complying with regulations is part of the cost of doing business. For bigger businesses that can absorb those costs (or rather, pass them on to…
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Federal Official Says Campus Speech Should Be Restricted to Protect Young People’s Brains
U.S. Civil Rights Commission member Michael Yaki says that speech on college campuses should be restricted to protect young people’s developing brains. This is yet…
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Federal Official Says Campus Speech Should Be Restricted to Protect Young People’s Brains
U.S. Civil Rights Commission member Michael Yaki says that speech on college campuses should be restricted to protect young people’s developing brains. This is yet…
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The Case for Repealing the Davis-Bacon Act
Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) is making the case for repealing the Depression-era Davis-Bacon Act. The law, passed in 1931, bars contractors and subcontractors from paying…
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Study Proves Economic Harm of Collective Bargaining
A new CEI study by economist Lowell Galloway and public policy expert Jonathan Robe demonstrates the harmful economic effects of unionization on a state-by-state basis. Among the…
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House Brings Transparency to Endangered Species Act, Still Needs to Protect Property Rights
Today the House passed H.R. 4315, the 21st Century Endangered Species Transparency Act. Unfortunately, it likely has no chance of passing in the Senate and word is…
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New Report Highlights Driverless Car Urban Impact; Takes Techno-Dystopian Stance
Earlier this month, Professor David Begg of Transport Times published a new report on automated transport technology focusing on the potential impacts on London. This is one of…
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Red Tapeworm 2014: Here Are the Federal Agencies that Issue the Most Regulations
This is Part 20 of a series taking a walk through some sections of Ten Thousand Commandments: An Annual Snapshot of the Federal Regulatory State (2014…
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Bitcoin’s Undiscovered Potential
A recent piece in American Banker magazine explores how Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies can help the underprivileged, particularly the millions of unbanked people who…
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Obama Claim Spurious; Labor Unions Furious; New Ranking Curious
Coauthored with Alex Bolt. President Barack Obama spuriously claimed, "These so-called right-to-work [RTW] laws, they don't have anything to do with economics," when he futilely…