(Thanks, Nora! - promoted by William Tucker)
Full of Tea Party zeal after voting to repeal lunch hours for all employees, the House Labor Committee took up a new right-to-work bill over the loud objections of the nearly 400 workers and community members who filled Reps Hall for today's hearing.
As Speaker O'Brien did last fall, Labor Committee chairman Gary Daniels invited political candidates to stump on the floor of the House in return for their endorsement of right-to-work. Gubernatorial candidates Ovid Lamontagne and Kevin Smith did the honors.
Never mind that both business owners and labor leaders think it's time to move on from the contentious battle over right-to-work that shook the Legislature last year.
As Mark MacKenzie, president of the New Hampshire AFL-CIO testified: "We have lower poverty levels, higher graduation rates, and higher wages than any right-to-work state. We have negotiated thousands of successful collective bargaining agreements. This law is not broken. There is no need for right-to-work."
Peter Church, owner of a small union printing shop in Manchester, agreed. From the Huffington Post: "This is not something that New Hampshire needs. It's certainly not something that anyone operating a business in New Hampshire wants."
And we can't forget about Robert Lynch, staunch Libertarian and celebrated author, who used his fifteen minutes at the microphone to promote both right-to-work and his new book, "Guardrails, God and Santa Claus", on the importance of freedom.
The overarching arguments haven't changed much from last year. Opponents say that right-to-work will take away workers' rights and lower their wages. (A new report from EPI economist Gordon Lafer bears out those conclusions.)
Proponents, on the other hand, will try to sell you something: either a book, or a candidate, or a complete fallacy about what our economy needs and how it works. |
