Obamacare and NLRB v. Boeing as Economy-Killers

In separate editorials today, the Wall Street Journal addresses yesterday’s 11th Circuit Court ruling declaring Obamacare’s individual mandate unconstitutional and the ongoing fallout from the National Labor Relations Board’s ruling (originally addressed here at BizzyBlog) that Boeing can’t open an already-constructed plant in South Carolina.

In the latter instance (“The NLRB Fear Factor”), it directly addresses how the NLRB’s authoritarian ruling is hurting the economy:

Some 60% (of those surveyed by the National Association of Manufacturers) said the government’s case already has—or could—hurt hiring. Sixty-nine percent said the case would damage job growth. And 49% said capital expenditure plans “have been or may be impacted by the NLRB’s complaint.” Around 1,000 of the association’s 11,000 members contributed to the survey. That’s a lot of lost jobs.

Some might dismiss these results as self-interested, or predictable given the general business distaste for regulation. But that ignores the role that confidence plays in reviving the animal spirits essential for economic growth. When CEOs or entrepreneurs fear political intervention that might impose higher costs, they are more reluctant to invest or to hire new employees. That’s especially true when the economy is already growing slowly, or emerging from recession.

… President Obama has refused to say a word of reproach to the agency. This is how you get economic growth of 0.8%.

As noted yesterday (first item at link), we’ll be very lucky if first-half growth is as “high” as 0.8% by the time the revisions come in. If President Obama was really interested in economic growth, he as Chief Executive would at a very minimum insist that the matter get resolved as quickly as possible; at a max, he’d haul out one of those Executive Order memo pads and resolve it himself. He’s done neither. The only reasonable conclusion to reach is that he doesn’t care about NLRB v. Boeing’s clearly damaging impact on the economy.

The other Journal editorial quotes yesterday’s Obamacare ruling (“Breathtaking in its Expansive Scope”), and only hints at the impact the legislation is having on the economy right here, right now:

Though the commerce power “has since come to dominate federal legislation,” as Judges Hall and Dubina note, the Court has always maintained that it “is subject to outer limits,” as the 1995 Lopez decision affirmed.

It is a measure of ObamaCare’s overreach that throughout this history, the government has never claimed a power like the individual mandate. “Even in the face of a Great Depression, a World War, a Cold War, recessions, oil shocks, inflation, and unemployment, Congress never sought to require the purchase of wheat or war bonds, force a higher savings rate or greater consumption of American goods, or require every American to purchase a more fuel efficient vehicle,” the majority writes.

Judge Hall (a Bill Clinton nominee) and Judge Dubina (a George H.W. Bush nominee) have delivered one of the most persuasive and tightly reasoned deconstructions of the mandate’s supposed constitutional logic, though of course the fate of the mandate lies with the Supreme Court. The new split among the appellate circuits ensures that one case or another will land in Washington—perhaps as soon as next spring.

“Perhaps as soon as next spring”?

Businesses considering expansion and the hiring that might go with it don’t have 8-10 months, “perhaps” more, to live in uncertainty as to what their costs of employment will be. Many if not most of them are pulling backin RIGHT NOW, as a result.

As with the NLRB situation, if President Obama and his administration really cared about growing the economy economy, he would ensure that Supreme Court review of Obamacare gets expedited and resolved. Again, the only reasonable conclusion to reach is that the Obama administration doesn’t care about NLRB v. Boeing’s clearly damaging impact on the economy.

The Journal today identified just two of a myriad of matters (add EPA regs on cars, trucks, power-plant emissions, unnecessary withholding of drilling permits, pervasive overregulation in general, etc.) which make it a wonder that businesses are hiring anyone at all. We’re condemned to a mediocre economy if these authoritarian barriers aren’t removed. If they’re not, only one administration will be to blame, and it’s not that of George W. Bush.