I realize that, when you’re talking about this publication, you’re talking about the pre-eminent propaganda tool of the “pay no price, bear no burden” investor class, but some ripe fertilizer is too pungent to ignore.
And that is the best setup I can come up with for the following dreck from Daniel Henninger yesterday (here)…
The Senate passed a $15 billion "jobs bill." Its proudest piece is a tax credit for employers who hire a person out of work at least 60 days. The employer won't have to pay the 6.2% Social Security payroll tax for what remains of this year. If the worker stays on the job at least a year, the government will give the employer $1,000.
As to the earlier $787 billion stimulus bill, Vice President Joe Biden praised it in Orlando this week as an engine of job creation, while he stood before a pile of broken concrete and asphalt. The subject was highways.
Finally, Barack Obama's government now may force companies to raise wages and benefits by squeezing their federal contracts if they don't.
Maybe there's a better way.
***
Let's bring back the robber barons.
OK, so…by giving a tax credit to employers to encourage hiring, Henninger believes that “force(s) companies to raise wages and benefits”?
And by the way, as noted here, Henninger con-vee-niently failed to note that Biden was highlighting “part of a $20 million project to expand a 3.8-mile stretch of U.S. Route 27 from four to six lanes. It will create between 20 and 50 jobs at different stages.”
But of course, if you’re Henninger, why should you let the facts get in the way of your talking points?
What I really objected to, though, was Henninger’s typically rose-colored look at the people who fueled America’s industrialization during the late 1800s and early 1900s, and for the purposes of this post, I’m going to highlight James Hill, Andrew Carnegie, and John D. Rockefeller, individuals who came to control the vital industries that fueled this country’s growth.
As Wikipedia tells us here, Hill was a railroad magnate who managed to build lines all across this country during The Industrial Age, often doing so on the backs (literally and figuratively) of his work force. So much so that…
…his hard micromanaging practices…eventually led to a railway-wide strike and the workers' unionization under the leadership of Eugene V. Debs. Hill and Debs agreed to arbitration by other business owners led by Charles Alfred Pillsbury. The result was restoration of the workers' wages to pre-(1893) depression levels.
And as far as Andrew Carnegie (steel) was concerned (here)…
The Homestead Strike was an industrial lockout and strike which began on June 30, 1892, culminating in a battle between strikers and private security agents on July 6, 1892. It is one of the most serious labor disputes in US history. The dispute occurred in the Pittsburgh-area town of Homestead, Pennsylvania, between the Amalgamated Association of Iron and Steel Workers (the AA) and the Carnegie Steel Company.
The AA was an American labor union formed in 1876. It was a craft union representing skilled iron and steel workers.
The AA's membership was concentrated in ironworks west of the Allegheny Mountains. The union negotiated national uniform wage scales on an annual basis; helped regularize working hours, workload levels and work speeds; and helped improve working conditions. It also acted as a hiring hall, helping employers find scarce puddlers and rollers.[1]
And as Wikipedia tells us, “puddling” was a means of manufacturing high-carbon and low-carbon steel, considered an art for that time.
And finally, I give you the Rockefellers, who owned the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company, a mining company involved in the “Ludlow Massacre” (here) which was the culmination of the 1913-1914 mining strike organized by the United Mine Workers of America (20 people, including 11 children and 2 women, were killed). In response, the so-called Colorado Coalfield War led to the deaths of anywhere from 69 to 199 people.
The UMWA tried to achieve recognition by the mining companies to address grievances; even though they failed to do so…
…the (1913-1914) strike had a lasting impact both on conditions at the Colorado mines and on labor relations nationally. John D. Rockefeller, Jr. engaged labor relations experts and future Canadian Prime Minister W. L. Mackenzie King to help him develop reforms for the mines and towns, which included paved roads and recreational facilities, as well as worker representation on committees dealing with working conditions, safety, health, and recreation. There was to be no discrimination against workers who had belonged to unions, and the establishment of a company union. The Rockefeller plan was accepted by the miners in a vote.
So it can be argued that John D. Rockefeller, Jr. (from a family that primarily made its fortune in oil, let’s not forget) ended up doing the right thing by his work force, but it took a strike to do it, as well as the deaths of scores of mine workers.
With all of this in mind, I can tell Henninger to keep his “robber barons.” Just because he works for one doesn’t mean the rest of us should be forced to do so also.
(And speaking of “three strikes,” I should note that the Phils edged the Yanks 3-2 in Grapefruit League play today – yaay!)
As reported in last Sunday's Philadelphia Inquirer, here is how Philadelphia-area members of Congress were recorded on major roll-call votes last week (posting will continue to be flaky for a little while, and I still don't know what I'm going to do about the pic).
