Free Market Focus: Voting Out Unelected Union Representation

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August 29, 2012     |    Discover more at Heritage's Enterprise and Free Markets webpage

Unelected Unions: Why Workers Should Be Allowed to Choose Their Representatives Unions negotiate workers’ terms of pay, promotion, layoff, and retirement; union members may not bargain for themselves. However, very few union members voted for this representation. Once organized, unions remain certified indefinitely: Most union members join as a condition of employment. At the very least, unions should regularly stand for re-election.  Even better, Congress and state legislatures should allow workers to choose whether they want union representation, and if so, who represents them—unionized or not. This would give workers the ability to negotiate terms that represent their needs, instead of being forced into a one-size-fits-all contract.  READ MORE >>

Conflict Minerals: Another Cost of D0dd-Frank On Wednesday, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) adopted a little-known section (and there are many) of the Dodd–Frank financial regulation bill that will end up doing the most harm to the people in the Congo that it purports to help.  The Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, Title XV, Section 1502, requires private companies (of any size) to disclose whether any “conflict minerals” that are necessary to the functionality or production of a product have “originated in the Democratic Republic of the Congo or an adjoining country.”  Gee, that sounds simple, right? Not really. READ WHY >>

Cronyism: Crushing the Free Market and Promoting Rent-Seeking Imagine your son or daughter aspiring to be a government crony instead of an engineer or business owner. That nightmare scenario plays out in a new video by Crony Chronicles, a website that fights cronyism. In the video, kids who might otherwise have become doctors and architects aspire instead to work in powerful government agencies or to become lobbyists to help put rules in place that favor their friends. WATCH THE VIDEO HERE >>

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