GOP senators press Biden to rescind pro-labor construction order

[applegrove]

GOP senators press Biden to rescind pro-labor construction order

BY KARL EVERS-HILLSTROM at the Hill 03/07/22 05:03 PM EST 34

https://thehill.com/policy/transportation/infrastructure/597207-gop-senators-press-biden-to-rescind-pro-labor

"SNIP.......

Forty-three GOP senators on Monday pushed back on President Biden’s executive order to require collective bargaining agreements between contractors and workers for federal construction projects. 

In a letter to Biden led by Sen. Todd Young (R-Ind.), lawmakers said the order, which requires project labor agreements (PLA) for federal construction contracts exceeding $35 million, would hurt the implementation of the bipartisan infrastructure bill signed last year. They noted that 87 percent of the private construction industry is not unionized. 

“Mandating PLAs will prevent qualified contractors from fairly competing for contracts on taxpayer-funded projects,” the senators wrote. “A fair and open bidding process for federal construction projects would guarantee the best value for hardworking taxpayers located in all geographies and regions across the United States.”

Biden signed the order last month at the Ironworkers Local 5 located in Upper Marlboro, Md. He said that it would boost wages and working conditions for construction workers and increase the overall quality of federal projects.

.......SNIP"

[ProudMNDemocrat]

1. Right To Work for the Lowest wages, doncha know?

Republicans have NEVER been in favor of better working conditions and wages for workers, even on Federal jobs. Their "Fuck em" attitude does not win them any cookies.

You go, Joe.

[keep_left]

12. "Right To Work" means "No Rights At Work". (n/t)

[SergeStorms]

2. They cry when......

contractors use slave-wage immigrant labor, and they cry when you take steps to use Union labor.

Is there anything that makes these snowflakes happy?

[I_UndergroundPanther]

6. Fascism

Grifting and bullying others and abusing those they see as beneath them in some bullshit hierarchy they believe in make these wastes of skin happy.

[Mr.Bill]

7. Yes. Grifting. n/t

[HariSeldon]

3. Lack of a collective bargaining agreement enables...

...management pressure to cut corners. It's harder (though not impossible) to retaliate against a union member who refuses to use the damaged materials or the wrong fasteners when the right ones are out-of-stock.

[aeromanKC]

4. What else would you expect from the party of the Moscow 8

Collective bargaining is one of the things that separates America from Russia. Fuck the Party of Moscow 8!!

[gratuitous]

5. Oh no! Qualified contractors can compete only by paying their employees less

Do these folks even listen to themselves? If a contractor is "qualified," that means the contractor has to pay the employees a living wage. Aren't the workers worth their wage? Who gives the best quality effort on a job: The barely-scraping-by worker petrified of being fired or the properly-compensated professional who can work with confidence?

Republicans like to go to bat for the big cheeses in the corner offices, claiming that companies can be competitive only if they're willing to compensate the executives at the highest scale. Why doesn't that logic apply (or "trickle down" if you will) to the employees doing the actual work of the company?

[Emile]

8. Republicans are all about cheap labor and tax cuts for billionaires.

[Atticus]

9. "87 percent of the private construction industry is not unionized."

THAT, in and of itself, is what is wrong.

Requiring OUR money to only be spent with UNION contractors is not the problem.

Republicans inviting scab-hirers to belly up to the trough is the problem.

[czarjak]

11. The Party of the Rich keeping promises? Work for a living and voting R are an impossible mix.