Monthly Archives: May 2015

May 03 2015
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Economics, International, National Politics

Fast Track to Lost Jobs and Lower Wages

From the Economic Policy Institute an easy to understand analysis of the Fast Track Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement and what it could do to American workers and businesses.  Good article with many clickable links to provide more information to topics raised.

A child performing “menial” work in the new unregulated, global economy.

Fast Track to Lost Jobs and Lower Wages

This week, Senator Hatch will reportedly introduce “fast track” (trade promotion authority) legislation in the Senate, to help President Obama complete the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), a trade and investment deal with eleven other countries in Asia and the Americas. “Fast Track” authority would allow the President to submit trade agreements to Congress without giving members of Congress the opportunity to amend the deal. Experience has shown that these trade and investment deals typically result in job losses and downward pressure on the wages of most American workers. The last thing America needs is renewal of fast track and more trade and investment deals rushed through Congress.

The administration has claimed that the TPP will create jobs, but it will not. There are other policies that have attracted bipartisan support, including ending currency manipulation and rebuilding infrastructure that could each create millions of U.S. jobs. President Obama has limited political capital to expend with the Republican-controlled Congress and he must choose his policies wisely.

Trade and Jobs?

For more than twenty years, both Democratic and Republican administrations have claimed that free trade agreements like the U.S. – Korea Free Trade Agreement (KORUS) and the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) would lead to growing U.S. exports and stimulate creation of goods jobs in the United States. Bill Clinton claimed that NAFTA would create 200,000 jobs in its first two years and a million jobs in five years. President Obama claimed that KORUS would “support 70,000 American jobs” because the agreement would “increase exports of American goods by $10 billion to $11 billion.”

Claims that trade and investment deals would support domestic job creation have proven to be empty promises. Expanding exports alone is not enough to ensure that trade adds jobs to the economy. Increases in U.S. exports tend to create jobs in the United States, but increases in imports lead to job loss—by destroying existing jobs and preventing new job creation—as imports displace goods that otherwise would have been made in the United States by American workers. Thus, it is changes in trade balances—the net of exports and imports—that determine the number of jobs created or displaced by trade and investment deals like NAFTA and KORUS.

More than 5 million U.S. manufacturing jobs were lost between 1997 and 2014, and most of those job losses were due to growing trade deficits with countries that have negotiated trade and investment deals with the United States.

Between 1993 (before NAFTA took effect) and 2013, the U.S. trade deficit with Mexico and Canada increased from $17.0 billion to $177.2 billion, displacing more than 850,000 U.S. jobs. Growing trade deficits and job displacement, especially between the United States and Mexico, were the result of a surge in outsourcing of production by U.S. and other foreign investors. The rise in outsourcing was fueled, in turn, by a surge in foreign direct investment (FDI) into Mexico, which increased by more than 150 percent in the post-NAFTA period.

KORUS took effect in March 2012. Between 2011 and 2014, U.S. exports to Korea increased by about $1 billion, but imports have increased by $13 billion, so the trade deficit has increased by nearly $12 billion. This growing trade deficit with Korea has cost more than 75,000 U.S. jobs.

Continue reading:  Fast Track to Lost Jobs and Lower Wages

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May 03 2015
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Economics, International, Labor and Worker Justice, National Politics, Protecting our Environment, Public Health

Fast-Track: An Undemocratic Path to Unfair “Trade”

As promised we bring you some more opinion and analysis on the Fast-Track push by Obama for the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement.  From the blog of the group Public Citizen:

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Fast Track

An Undemocratic Path to Unfair “Trade”

President Obama is asking Congress to delegate to him extreme Fast Track authority to railroad into place job-killing trade agreements like the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP).

ALERT! A Fast Track bill has recently been introduced. Click here for the full analysis.

Fast Track was an extreme and rarely-used procedure initially created by President Richard Nixon to get around public debate and congressional oversight. Fast Track is how we got into the job-killing, wage-flattening North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and the World Trade Organization (WTO). Thanks to Fast Track, NAFTA and the WTO included terms that promote the offshoring of U.S. jobs to low-wage countries.

Fast Track also empowered executive branch officials advised by large corporations to skirt Congress and the public and use secretive “trade” agreements to roll back a wide range of non-trade policies on which our families rely for safe food, a clean environment, affordable medicines, financial stability and more.

Fast Track set up a system of more than 500 official corporate U.S. trade advisors who have access to secret trade agreement texts and who have set the “U.S.” trade agenda whether we have Democratic or Republican presidents.

Fast Track is such an extreme power grab that in the past 21 years Congress has only allowed it to go into effect for five years total. Why? Because under the U.S. Constitution, Congress is supposed to write the laws and set trade policy. For 200 years, these key checks and balances helped ensure that no one branch of government had too much power. But, starting with Nixon, presidents have tried to seize those congressional powers using the Fast Track mechanism. hide

Fast Track has only been used 16 times in the history of our nation, often to enact the most controversial of “trade” pacts, such as the NAFTA and the establishment of the WTO. Meanwhile, hundreds of less controversial U.S. trade agreements have been implemented without resort to Fast Track, showing that the extraordinary procedure is not needed to approve trade agreements.

Fast Track allowed the executive branch to unilaterally select partner countries for “trade” pacts, decide the agreements’ contents, and then negotiate and sign the agreements – all before Congress had a vote on the matter! Normal congressional committee processes were forbidden, meaning that the executive branch was empowered to write lengthy legislation on its own with no review or amendments. These executive-authored bills altered wide swaths of U.S. law unrelated to trade – food safety, immigration visas, energy policy, medicine patents and more – to conform our domestic policies to each agreement’s requirements. And, remarkably, Fast Track let the executive branch control Congress’ voting schedule. Unlike any other legislation, both the House and Senate were required to vote on a Fast Tracked trade agreement within 90 days of the White House submitting it. No floor amendments were allowed and debate was limited.

Because Fast Track’s dramatic shift in the balance of powers between branches of the U.S. government occurred via an arcane procedural mechanism, it obtained little scrutiny – until recently. Its use by Democratic and Republican presidents alike to seize Congress’ constitutional prerogatives, “diplomatically legislate” non-trade policy, and preempt state policy, has made it increasingly controversial.

A president cannot obtain Fast Track empowerment without a vote of Congress. President Clinton, renowned for trade expansion, only had Fast Track authority for two of his eight years in office due to congressional opposition. Indeed, in 1998 Clinton’s effort to get Fast Track authority was rejected by 171 House Democrats and 71 House GOP members.

The last time Congress authorized Fast Track was in 2002, with a 3:30 am vote before a congressional recess in which the antiquated mechanism was approved by just three votes. Since 2007, Congress has refused to authorize this extreme procedure, even after its proponents tried to escape Fast Track’s bad reputation by renaming it “Trade Promotion Authority.” The bill currently before Congress would replicate the widely-opposed Fast Track bill from 2002.

As a candidate, President Obama said he would replace this anti-democratic process. But now he is asking Congress to grant him Fast Track’s extraordinary authority – in part to try to overcome growing public and congressional opposition to his controversial TPP and Trans-Atlantic Free Trade Agreement (TAFTA) deals. To prevent an expansion of this unfair “trade” model, Congress must not allow the executive branch to once again gain Fast Track’s undemocratic powers.

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May 03 2015
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NH Politics

…and speaking of Libertarians and other local nutjobs…

Susanthebruce has noted the odd ruminations and actions of some of the Free Staters and wing-nut/tea bagger factions on the right this week.  First, there’s JR Hoell, state representative, Republican, of Hudson who as we have it on the downlow, actually had to fight for his seat this last session because some determined progressives decided to give him a run for his money. And now we show you one example of why progressives shouldn’t let up but instead fight relentlessly to unseat people like Hoell:

In Susan’s twitter feed:

Hoell calls himself NH_Braveheart.  Yes, you read it right.  The guy who one session famously put forward a piece of legislation that still had the watermark from the infamous one size fits all states bill-mill, ALEC.  Hoell was too clueless to at least remove the ALEC marking before introducing legislation and pretending that he originated it out of his own head.

Hoell, who comforted the grieving families and community-members after the tragic Newtown Connecticut shooting by repeating shallow PR lines from the NRA and thus placing blame on the victims and minimizing the tragedy.

Hoell, who looking like the ass he apparently is willing to be for the gun lobby, said the right-wing darling, Scott Brown was not actually right-wing enough and he’d incite an “armed rebellion” if Scott were elected to the New Hampshire senate.  Scott was of course defeated to relief of everyone, despite the opportunity many saw to put Hoell out of his misery once and for all.

JR Hoell

JR Hoell. Imagine this man with a gun.

Hoell, who bragged of his practice of registering domain names using the names of state politicians or even those seeking office.  At least one state rep candidate in 2014 has complained to the secretary of state’s office about this practice and how it was used as a means to harass and slander her by publishing misleading or downright lies about her on a page dressed up to appear as her campaign page.  No charges were filed.

Hoell, who introduced legislation attempting to ban state enforcement of federal firearms regulations (constitutionally impossible) that was proposed by another outside organization.

Hoell who, out of concern for the “excessive paperwork” of some companies, proposed with another state legislator, to ban employee lunch breaks across the board in New Hampshire.  Let’s say that again in case you didn’t get it the first time:

They proposed to remove the requirement of work places to allow for at least a half-hour lunch break when an employee works seven hours or more (as the law now requires in NH).  Hoell and his twenty-year old legislative cohort didn’t have an opinion on the required fifteen-minute break after four hours, but we’d assume they’d see that as an unnecessary burden to companies as well.

Hoell, who works hard to restrict a woman’s right to choose, including participating in and supporting pro-life groups at every opportunity, even supporting the supreme court attack on the buffer zone law meant to keep religious zealots from harassing patients entering or leaving women’s health clinics (which for the majority of care do not perform abortions, but the zealots don’t care; a harlot is a harlot to them).

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May 03 2015
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Labor and Worker Justice, NH Politics

Libertarian Based Uber Driver Services Pushed into Manchester by Democrats??

Jon Hopwood gives a very thorough analysis of the Uber “ride sharing” program as it pushes its way across the country, leaving a trail of injuries, assaults, rapes and even complaints of price gouging.  As Jon Hopwood notes and as is supported by this Wa-Po article, former Obama advisor David Plouffe has thrown his hat into the ring of cash opportunity by accepting a position as their PR chief.  We’ve been told that Uber was also used by NH Democratic leadership to shuttle party dignitaries  back and forth to the Jefferson-Jackson Day Dinner last October.

Its troubling that Democrats support the Uber “ride sharing” company even though Uber’s business model mimics a popular trend of companies skirting employment law by declaring their workforce comprises “independent contractors“.  This practice, popular among unethical business owners and especially among libertarians, shifts the burden of business expenses and losses from the business owner directly onto the worker.  Also called misclassification this practice has already caused the erosion of living wages and protections for workers in many industries such as construction, IT and many service industries.  In 2014, as this report from the Boston Globe states, a class-action lawsuit was filed on behalf of Boston Uber drivers claiming that their classification as independent contractors amounts to fraud, the drivers also claimed that Uber demanded a portion of all tips as well, contrary to Massachusetts law.

As traditional supporters of labor and workers, that the Democratic leadership in New Hampshire would choose to support and even hire this very anti-worker and anti-consumer company speaks volumes.  That Garth Corriveau, a Manchester alderman and darling of the Democratic leadership, would be pushing Uber onto Manchester despite many of the well documented problems it poses and its threat to further eroding regulations to protect workers should cause good people to stop and think.  Does the Democratic leadership in New Hampshire really care about workers? Many at the state level have vowed to assist labor in working to stop the erosion of worker’s protections and the fraud of misclassification.  With their leadership treating the issue so cavalierly, can we be confident that they will in fact defend labor?  Will they work to rid New Hampshire of the economic and social scourge of misclassification?  Some things to think about.  Now onto Jon Hopwood’s look at Uber and its efforts to destroy regulations of drivers in Manchester and other cities to gain a foothold on the market:

Uber Über Manchester: Ride-Sharing Company Lobbies For Special Treatment

Alderman Garth Corriveau (l.) & BOMA Chair Dan O'Neil
Alderman Garth Corriveau (l.) & BOMA Chair Dan O’Neil
Jon Hopwood

MANCHESTER, NH — The controversial ride-sharing company Uber has brought its confrontational management style to Manchester. Buoyed by a lobbying effort marshaled nationally by former Obama presidential campaign major domo David Plouffe, Uber is trying to justify its Ayn Rand Atlas Shrugged management philosophy as a harbinger of 21st Century High Tech new millennialism rather than a throwback to the dog-eat-dog, the public-be-damned social Darwinism of the Gilded Age.

Manchester is home to the Manchester-Boston Regional Airport (MHT), New England’s fourth busiest airport. Approximately 2.5 million passengers used MHT in 2013, making it a major market for the livery services that a ride-sharing company like Uber can provide.

App or Transportation Company?

The major question being asked in Manchester, as well across the nation: Is Uber a tech company selling an app, or a transportation company?

During a December 19th, 2014 appearance on the Girard at Large radio show, Ward 6 Alderman Garth Corriveau — Uber’s paladin on the Queen City Board of Mayor and Alderman (BOMA) — made the argument that Uber was a tech company peddling an app, though under questioning, he did concede that it was a transportation services company.

The crux of Corriveau’s argument was that Uber drivers were independent contractors and, unlike taxi cab companies, Uber did not own the fleet. Ride-share drivers provide their own vehicles. The Democrat Corriveau agreed with ultra-conservative Republican radio show host Rich Girard that the market should regulate Uber.

While Uber’s stance that its drivers are independent contactors isn’t questioned by Corriveau, it has been by some of the company’s drivers and by federal judges.

Independent Contractors or Employees?

In California, Uber drivers disenchanted with the company have sued the company on the grounds that they’re employees entitled to minimum wage, reimbursement for expenses and other benefits. Skeptical that Uber’s drivers are independent contractors, a federal judge in the 9th Circuit declared while adjudicating a lawsuit pitting Uber against its so-called “independent contractors” that they may, indeed, have to be treated as employees.

Uber’s contention that is is merely an app (software program), a view shared by Alderman Corriveau, has not been embraced by U.S. District Judge Edward Chen.

“The idea that Uber is simply a software platform,” Chen said, “ I don’t find that a very persuasive argument.”

It is important for the members of Manchester’s BOMA (aside from Corriveau) to note that Uber uses the “independent contractor” argument to deflect liability for accidents and corporate responsibility for discrimination practiced by its drivers.

When a national group representing the disabled attacked Uber over complaints that its drivers discriminated against the blind, the company dismissed the allegations on the grounds that it can’t control what its drivers do because they’re independent contractors. Uber rejected a request by the group to negotiate a solution to the problem of its drivers refusing to service the blind and, in one instance, mistreating a blind-person’s guide dog.

Taxi cab operators are forbidden by federal law from discriminating against the disabled, regardless of whether cabbies legally are considered independent contractors.

Background Checks

Uber has had problems with its background checks of drivers. Without a regulation requiring the use of a sophisticated background checking system, Uber and other ride-sharing companies can eschew more thorough (and thus more expensive) background checks in favor of cheaper, less thorough checks, such as those services that glean info from online government databases. The updating of those databases often is spotty.

Uber failed to perform background checks on at least one of its drivers in Chicago.

Uber, Lyft and Sidecar — two other ride-sharing companies in the Chicago market – use different background check services, raising the specter of “gaps” in the researching of the criminal backgrounds of potential ride-share drivers. Without a regulation on background checks mandating the scope of the coverage, no one can be sure how thorough or up-to-date the search is.

Background checks can be cursory and create a static picture in time, i.e., one that is not updated after the initial check. Taxi cab companies in California use “Live Scan”, a dynamic service that combs databases and updates information about new offenses, informing the cab company when a driver has incurred a violation.

Incidentally, Live Scan was NOT mandated by California’s state regulatory authority for Uber or other ride-sharing companies. Uber had launched an intense lobbying effort on the California Public Utilities Commission, and the lack of a mandate for Live Scan may be a result. The background checks for Uber drivers in California likely will be less stringent than that of cab drivers.

In response to problems with Uber and the other ride-sharing companies, Chicago regulators proposed the standardization of regulations on background checks and a mandate requiring the name and photo of drivers on ride-share company’s apps and web sites, akin to the “licenses” posted in taxis.

Safety and the Insurance Gap

The Uber app poses a safety issue, akin to the problem of texting by drivers. Uber drivers use a dashboard mounted app akin to a GPS that – along with the cutthroat nature of the taxi business – might distract them.

The app is always on and Uber drivers, competing against each other and traditional “hail” taxis, are constantly monitoring it in the fierce competition for fares. There is concern that the distraction of driver monitoring of the Uber app may cause accidents and that accidents that occur before or after a driver ferries a passenger will not be covered by insurance.

Compounding the problem is Uber’s use of a donut hole defense to deny responsibility for accidents that occur when the driver is not actually transporting a fare, most notably in the death of a San Francisco girl killed by one of its drivers. Unlike a traditional, regulated taxi company, Uber claims that its insurance only kicks in when the driver picks up a fare; while a driver is waiting for passengers, driving to a passenger, and after discharging a passenger, Uber claims it bearsd no liability for the actions of its drivers. In contrast, cabbies working for traditional taxi services are covered at all times.)

Uber’s insurance coverage paradigm has created a “gap” in coverage. This gap may provide a ride-share driver’s auto insurer with the grounds to deny coverage for those accidents Uber refuses to cover, as the insurer may consider them actually working for Uber at the time of the accident.

Because of the uniqueness of the ride-sharing model, insurance companies increasingly are refusing coverage to drivers.

To Regulate or Not to Regulate

That Uber drivers not ferrying a passenger, and thus not covered by Uber’s commercial general liability insurance, likely are distracted by the pressure of monitoring Uber’s app, raises questions over safety and an “insurance gap” that only regulators like Manchester’s BOMA can answer.

In response to these problems, Uber was classified as a a transportation company by the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) in September 2013 because it performs like a telephone dispatch taxi service. Creating a new category of livery service called “Transportation Network Company” (TNC) for Uber and its ride-sharing kin that provide online apps to book rides, the CPUC became the first state regulator to recognize ride-sharing as an official transportation service.

The new regs were akin to those governing the provision of limousine services. They covered background checks, drug testing, liability insurance and driver training.

In November 2014, the CPUC issued more stringent regulations on insurance coverage, tackling the issue of the gap in insurance coverage. The CPUC mandated that there were three “periods” in the provision of ride-sharing services: Period One, when the TNC’s app is open and the TNC driver is waiting for a fare, called a “match” of the driver and the passenger; Period Two, when the match has been accepted but the driver has not yet picked up the passenger; and Period Three, when the driver transports the passenger on a trip, from the time the client enters the vehicle and until they exit it.

For the first period, the regs mandate a minimum of coverage of $100,000 for one person and $300,000 for two or more people, plus $50,000 for property damage. For the second and third periods, a minimum of $1 million in primary commercial liability insurance coverage is required. The coverage can be provided by the TNC in whole or in partnership with the driver.

The CPUC regulations, which also cover such areas as licensing, vehicle inspection, and providing service at airports, provide a template for the BOMA for regulating TNCs in Manchester.

Jon’s article was originally published in the Examiner, we use it here in full with his permission.

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