The Republican Congress and President are not about to eliminate whole cabinet departments like the Department of Labor. They’re not going to eliminate entire labor laws, as libertarians want. What they can do if they really want to improve labor markets and reward voters who were concerned about the economy and jobs is to reform labor laws. At a bare, really bare minimum, they can undo what Obama has done.
Labor law is where the real action is in improving job prospects, pay, productivity, and working conditions in America, not in tariffs, “trading abuses” and exchange rates. This is a forbidding area that turns most economists and journalists off. It’s too specialized and arcane. It’s politically inflammatory because it opens wounds and emotions that go back over a hundred years. Business vs. labor blinds the issue. Republican vs. Democratic constituencies really cloud the issue. Trump’s 100 day program makes no direct mention of labor law.
Obama made changes in law that hurt workers and smaller businesses while benefiting large corporations, but his rhetoric said the opposite. Republicans can make changes that will help workers and small businesses, but they will have to overcome the image that what they might do is harming those constituencies. The 21st century demands better of us. We have to see through and dispose of old political positions that distort the realities of labor laws and markets.
The headline issues over which there are highly-publicized fights, like minimum wage and right-to-work laws, divert attention from the behind-the-scenes nuts and bolts regulations that are really much more important.
For a calm and thoughtful look at this area, see here, here and here for increasing levels of detail on recommendations. See also here.
8:45 am on November 17, 2016 Email Michael S. Rozeff
