CEI Video Ad Tells Florida Taxpayers About Labor Union Subsidy

The Competitive Enterprise Institute is running an online-video ad campaign in Tallahassee to educate Florida taxpayers about legislation to end a longtime subsidy handed out to labor unions. The ad campaign relates to CEI’s work criticizing so-called union “release time,” the practice of state and local government workers being diverted from their jobs to conduct union work, all paid for by taxpayers.

The 15-second ad is scheduled to run in Florida until April 15 on Facebook, Twitter, and Google.

“It’s unfair to Florida taxpayers to have government workers excused from public service to do union work on the taxpayers’ dime,” said Trey Kovacs, CEI labor policy analyst and co-author of a 2017 report exposing release time in the Sunshine State. “It is encouraging that lawmakers are looking for ways to curtail the release time scam and get people back to work in jobs that serve the public interest.”

Release time costs taxpayers over $3 million annually in just Miami-Dade County, City of Tampa and City of Jacksonville, information revealed in a 2017 open records request and subsequent report. In addition, in these same cities, public employees spend over 100,000 hours annually on union business.

View the ad: cei.org/unionscam.

View the 2017 report “Union Time on the Taxpayer Dime.”