Labor Shows Increase in Deaths on the Job

There's been swift movement in Congress to gut regulatory measures for businesses and corporations throughout much of the United States as proponents of anti-regulatory measures site regulations as an impediment to job growth during the Recession. However, sometimes, as a new AFL-CIO report has found, many times regulations are there to protect the workers from abuses.

Every day in 2010, 13 workers were killed on the job and nearly 50,000 were killed by job-related diseases, an alarming uptick in totals from 2009. That's according to the AFL-CIO.

The largest U.S. federation of labor unions, AFL-CIO, released a report Wednesday that shows from 2009 to 2010, 3.1% more workers were killed on the job, totaling 4,690. The long-term trends are decreasing, but with the current state of the economy and so many Americans unemployed, analysts think the number of deaths would have been even higher.

The study lashes out at regulatory measures that have stalled in Congress, mostly from a cohesive Republican House that views regulations as impediments to job creation and growth. The AFL-CIO supports President Obama's initiatives to strengthen workers' laws, but cites an intractable Office of Management and Budget, the agency which oversees rulemaking as leaving new laws in "purgatory". "The job safety laws need to be strengthened," the report concludes. "The nation must renew the committment to protect workers from injury, disease and death and make this a high priority."

The report certainly does not seem without merit. In 2010, the U.S. witnessed 29 miners killed by an explosion in a Massey Energy mine, as well as 11 rig operators killed when the Deep Horizon oil rig exploded sparking the BP Gulf of Mexico spill.

Wal-Mart Lobbies Changes to Bribery Law

Wal-Mart, America's largest employer, now under investigation for allegations of bribery in Mexico, may also have been an influential voice in efforts to reform the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA), the international law protecting against such things as bribing foreign companies in order to hurdle regulatory restrictions in garnering building and/or zoning permits. As the Washington Post reports, the Institute for Legal Reform, a branch of the Chamber of Commerce, has sought to "clarify" the law in a push for amendments. These efforts have gone largely unnoticed in the public eye, but there have been battles raging in Congress and the White House on this issue.

The Chamber seeks reforms to the 1977 Watergate-era law in limiting a company's liability for the actions of its subsidiaries and a clearer definition of who qualifies as a "foreign official." The push for these changes comes in response to an increase in enforcement by federal authorities. However, according to Paul Pelletier, a former supervisor in the FCPA unit, the increased scrutiny came because it had found more and more violations of the law. "The more we lifted up rocks, the more we saw of it."

This case illustrates perfectly the legitimacy and necessity of federal regulation when regulators in charge are doing what they are appointed to do. This isn't a case of bureaucratic overreach, or intrusive government meddling in business and free market affairs, as it seems the Chamber (and likely anti-government legislators in the House and Senate) would want you to think. It is clear that the law is working and the people in charge of enforcing it are competent. This suggests the need for stricter regulations to broaden the effectiveness of the department.

What I see here in the ILR and the Chamber's efforts is an attempt to "clarify" the law so that they can figure out new ways around it, work some loophole so that bribes are technically no longer illegal. By narrowing the definition of a "foreign official," Wal-Mart, or any other international corporation, could then simply tip-toe around this definition. As assistant U.S. attorney general Lanny A. Breuer, notes, "This is precisely the wrong moment in history to weaken the FCPA. There is no argument for becoming more permissive when it comes to corruption." Wal-Mart didn't like the law, so they didn't abide by it, and even when it was brought to the attention of their then-CEO, they brushed the internal investigation beneath the rug and failed to alert authorities in the U.S. It has also been reported that their current CEO knew of these allegations back when they were first divulged to company executives in 2005. Even if the ILR, the Chamber, and Wal-Mart succeed in reforming the law and company liability, it doesn't seem their top executives could still escape scrutiny since they were complicit in the cover-up.

Matt Taibbi: Worst JOBS Act Ever

Matt Taibbi over at Rolling Stone has an intriguing piece up from Monday discussing the recent JOBS -"Jumpstart Our Business Startups"- Act, a law rammed through Congress, the Senate, and signed by President Obama last week that will, essentially, pave the way for widespread fraud in the stock market. But, Taibbi shows, the law could be far more dangerous.

"In fact, one could say this law is not just a sweeping piece of deregulation that will have an increase in securities fraud as an accidental, ancillary consequence. No, this law actually appears to have been specifically written to encourage fraud in the stock markets."

Read more: http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/blogs/taibblog/why-obamas-jobs-act-couldnt-suck-worse-20120409#ixzz1rfG6vt5v

"JOBs" Act: H.R.3606 - "Return Greed to Wall Street Act"

The House is set today to vote on H.R.3606, the Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act, a.k.a. the JOBs Act. (UPDATE: the bill passed with bi-partisan support.) According to many sources, this is a terrible bill that once again deregulates Wall St., essentially returning investment in small businesses to the days of Enron and WorldCom, where fraud and investment protection will run rampant.

Here's Simon Johnson over at his blog, BaseLineScenario:

"Markets with weak investor protection and little effective disclosure are subject to a great deal of volatility. They also do not typically do well over time – there might be a boom for a while, but fraud and excess generally prevail, resulting in a big collapse. Well-connected people, including many stock brokers, can do well – this was the experience in the US stock market frenzy of the 1920s. But ordinary investors do not thrive in this environment – and ultimately everyone suffers, as in the 1930s..." continue reading here.

And here's what Eliot Spitzer has to say:

"Ten years ago, virtually all of the major investment banks on Wall Street were charged with a monumental deception of the American investing public: touting stocks as great investments when in truth the banks believed the stocks to be “dogs,” “pieces of ----,“ and worse. The banks did this because of the conflicts of interest woven into their business model. They were underwriting the very stocks they were also touting, making the investing public dupes helping the banks generate enormous fees..." continue reading here.

How Obama Tried to Sell Out Liberalism in 2011

By Jonathan Chait at New York Magazine

"Last summer, President Obama desperately attempted to forge a long-term deficit reduction deal with Congressional Republicans. The notion that he could get the House GOP to accept any remotely balanced agreement was preposterous and doomed from the start, but Obama responded to the increasingly obvious reality by reducing his demands of the Republicans to virtually nothing..." continue reading article.