Bush's Labor Policies

In case you haven't heard, President Bush's Labor Department is now advising companies on How to get out of paying their workers overtime. Tim Young has some good commentary on the subject:

"One unfortunate consequence of the failure of John Edwards' presidential campaign to catch on is that less attention is being given to a major campaign theme of his - that the Bush administration has embarked on a series of policies that are singularly harmful to the vast majority of Americans who have to work for a living.

"Whether it's trying to undo the 40-hour work week, gutting workplace safety protections, or - most notably - transforming federal tax and economic policy to disadvantage those who rely on the fruits of their labor vis-a-vis those who derive income from sitting on the accumulation of capital, there is a War on Workers afoot. "

I also blogged about this yesterday on Dean Nation, where I recommended (of course) Howard Dean's labor policies as the antidote. And while I know I have a few strongly anti-labor readers, consider: How else do we fight for fair working conditions in this country without simply relying on government to impose solutions from above? The union system may be imperfect, but at root it's about workers getting together to fight for a fair piece of the unprecedented American prosperity, a result of their labor which is all too easily monopolized by corporate bigwigs. And in today's new economy we need that almost as much as we did 100 years ago, or a two-class society is right around the corner.