Union Bosses Say the Darndest Things

As described in an OpenMarket post by CEI’s Ivan Osorio a couple weeks ago, the Teamsters union and UPS are currently lobbying Congress to change FedEx’s labor law status, thereby making it easier for the Teamsters to organize FedEx drivers.

Today, the Washington Times ran an article on the ongoing battle, which included a you-can’t-make-this-up quote from Teamsters boss James P. Hoffa:

FedEx has built much of its empire on low-cost business models and other unsavory tactics, some of which are now coming back to haunt it.

This quote, which the Times pulled from a Teamsters-run anti-FedEx website, typifies the backward thinking of the organized labor movement: Business cost-savings should be thought of as “unsavory.” Labor, for those of this mindset, is not seen as a production input; rather, work is viewed as an end in itself. Consumer welfare, let alone shareholder welfare, is rarely considered at all.

This should appear ridiculous to anyone with even a cursory understanding of economics–you work in order to consume the things you want. Unfortunately for consumers, Big Labor is now driving U.S. economic policy.