Republicans put their Founding Funders ahead of the American people

Government regulations create jobs and save lives

 

The republican mantra that “regulations kill jobs” is deceiving, unless you are talking about new hires at mortuaries that will be needed as people die from dirty drinking water, lung disease from breathing polluted air, or eating food contaminated with mercury. 

Republicans and their right wing propaganda outlets such as Fox “News”, say that thousands of regulations prevent jobs from being created, even though CEO’s say that that is NOT true, and as economists, including republican economists, show data that refutes the GOP’s misinformation.

 Mike Morris, the CEO at American Electric Power said, “We have to hire plumbers, electricians, painters, folks who do that kind of work when you retrofit a plant. Jobs are created in the process — no question about that.”

 

A report by the independent Political Economy Research Institute (PERI), at the University of Massachusetts, estimates that more than 250,000 jobs will be created through installation of new equipment at existing power plants and construction of new clean energy facilities.

The data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics show that regulations are having virtually no impact on job losses. In 2010, only 0.3% of job losses occurred because of government regulation.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) made a statement today on the Senate floor;

 

Republican economist says GOP spreads the falsehood because it has no plan to create jobs.

Bruce Bartlett, an advisor to President Ronald Reagan ​and a Treasury official under President George H.W. Bush, is a trusted, conservative voice on economics. He offered these strong words on the regulation monster under Big Business’ bed:

“No hard evidence is offered for this claim; it is simply asserted as self-evident and repeated endlessly throughout the conservative echo chamber… In my opinion, regulatory uncertainty is a canard invented by Republicans that allows them to use current economic problems to pursue an agenda supported by the business community year in and year out. In other words, it is a simple case of political opportunism, not a serious effort to deal with high unemployment.”

 

But why use regulations proven to protect the health of every man, woman and child in this nation as a scapegoat? What are the origins of the myth?

I believe – as Bartlett does – that Republicans are attacking regulation because they don’t have a plan to create jobs and turn our economy around.

While Democrats have been pushing time-tested remedies for a flagging economy, such as infrastructure investments or middle-class tax cuts, our Republican colleagues have been peddling a cure-all tonic of deregulation.

Bartlett says, “People are increasingly concerned about unemployment, but Republicans have nothing to offer them.”

They’ve offered up the specter of overreaching government regulation to distract from the fact that they haven’t offered a single idea for how to put America back to work.

And they use the argument to justify rolling back everything from clear air and water safeguards to Wall Street and health insurance industry reforms.

What’s more, they’ve spread the tall tale that removing these regulations and letting Big Business do exactly as it pleases will not only prevent job losses, but actually create new jobs.

Bartlett called that logical leap “nonsense.”

“It's just made up,” he said. So, let’s talk fact, not fiction.

*****

Republicans want to kill new financial regulations that were put in place to help prevent another economic collapse that financial institutions caused in 2008. Republicans want to kill the EPA regulations that require some of the oldest coal power plants to upgrade their facilities so they pollute less. 

Republicans want to give free rein to some of the biggest polluters in our country and free rein to financial institutions that have destroyed our economy. And Republicans fought to kill or marginalize the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau that will help all Americans from being ripped off by banks.  

The Republican Party works against American families and against you. Republicans put their own jobs and their Founding Funders ahead of the American people and the United States.

Don't miss any of the Las Vegas Democrat Examiner articles: Click Subscribe and enter your email address or choose the RSS feed. Either way you’ll be alerted to the latest column when it's published. And don't forget to click Email to send this article to a friend.