Workers coming out ahead with Walker Wisconsin reforms

DeRoy Murdock:

Hillary Rodham Clinton shed her usual sunny demeanor on Monday and snarled at Republicans in general and one presidential candidate in particular.

“Republican governors like Scott Walker have made their names stomping on workers’ rights, and practically all Republican candidates would do the same as president,” Clinton growled at Manhattan’s New School. “I will fight back against these mean-spirited, misguided attacks. Evidence shows that the decline of unions may be responsible for a third of the increase of inequality among men. So, if we want to get serious about raising income, we have to get serious about supporting union workers.”

Later that day, AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka snapped, “Scott Walker is a national disgrace.”

Liberals like Clinton and Trumka have it all wrong. Workers have been waxing, not waning, under Walker. And they can thank his free-market reforms for improving their lives.

If there’s one thing workers value, it’s work. And on this score, Wisconsin’s Republican governor has delivered.

The Badger State’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate fell from 7.4 percent in January 2011 (the month of Walker’s inauguration) to 4.6 percent in May 2015 (the latest available figure).

US joblessness dropped from 9.0 percent to 5.5 percent over that period. Wisconsin’s unemployment, thus, stands well below America’s.

May’s labor-force participation rate also was higher in Wisconsin (67.9 percent) than across America (62.9 percent). These figures are down in both places, compared to when Walker arrived.
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Concerning ready cash, workers are faring significantly better under Walker than Obama.

According to the latest Census statistics, Wisconsin’s inflation-adjusted, median household income grew 2.7 percent, from $53,795 in 2010 to $55,258 in 2013. During those years, America’s equivalent household income shrank 1.3 percent, from $52,646 to $51,939. Indeed, under Walker, workers’ paychecks swelled by double what they shriveled under Obama.

In terms of “workers’ rights,” Wisconsinites now enjoy the right to work. In March, Walker signed a bill passed by the Republican-led legislature.

This new law recognizes a woman’s right to choose whether or not to join a union. (This statute applies to men, too.) Wisconsinites no longer may be compelled to join unions as a condition of employment. Clinton and Trumka are anti-choice on union membership.
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The workers are also benefiting from not having to pay union bosses which also means more money in their pockets.  Workers are clearly better off and so is the State, since the Democrats' corrupt bargain with the union bosses has been removed.  Under that corrupt bargain, unions required the state to withhold dues which would in turn be used to elect more Democrats so that tax payers would have to pay more for government.  Now the workers and the taxpayers are better off.

Clinton would like to return to the crrupt bargain of the past.