Expert Compliance Insights & Tips for Businesses

March 20, 2009
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The 'Human Monster' Rick Berman Is At It Again

anti-union Rick Berman
The man whose very son called him "despicable" and a "human molestor," labor antagonist Rick Berman, is spreading the word again--the word against the EFCA, Employee Free Choice Act. At least he's come up with interesting anti-EFCA studies, though one can never know the extent of the bias (if any) built into these things. First, he cites Princeton economist David Lee, who studied the effect ...
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March 19, 2009
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Study Ranks States on the Freedom Scale

state freedom index
The Mercatus Center of George Mason University has released the "first-ever" freedom rankings for all 50 states, rating each state in terms of fiscal policy, regulatory policy, economic freedom and personal freedom. We develop and justify our ratings and aggregation procedure on explicitly normative criteria, defining individual freedom as the ability to dispose of one’s own life, libe...
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March 19, 2009
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Top U.S. Companies with Most Cash on Hand in 2025

economy U.S. businesses
The top one probably isn't too hard to figure out (think gas pump gouging), but here's a list of the top 15 firms in the U.S. in terms of hoarded cash: Exxon Mobil - (XOM) - Total Cash: $32.007 BillionCisco Systems - (CSCO) - Total Cash: $29.531 BillionApple - (AAPL) - Total Cash: $25.647 BillionBerkshire Hathaway - (BRK.A) - Total Cash: $25.539 BillionPfizer Inc - (PFE) - Total Cash: $23.731 ...
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March 19, 2009
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WalMart Set to Cash in on EHR Boom

Barack Obama EHRs electronic health records
You don't get to be the world's largest retailer without having some chops. Evidently reading the Obamaic tea leaves during the 2008 campaign, WalMart set in motion a plan to market Electronic Health Record (EHR) computer systems to physicians, and in so doing has come up with a system that shaves 50 percent off the price of its competitors. Using its Sam's Club operation, the Arkansas giant ...
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March 18, 2009
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The Curious Case of Major League Baseball

anti-trust exemption Major League Baseball MLB
Major League Baseball, or MLB, has enjoyed a federal antitrust exemption since 1922 due to a Supreme Court's ruling that the sport did not engage in interstate commerce. Quite curious because even back then, teams had to cross state lines to play each other, but the ruling has nonetheless stayed on the books, so to speak, ever since. The ruling was reaffirmed in 1953 and again in 1972 in the C...
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March 16, 2009
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Wasteful Spending on Stimulus Projects?

federal contractors stimulus plan
If you thought that four years late and $350 million over budget for the largely unneeded U.S. Capitol Visitor Center was bad, wait till you see what the projects flowing from the recent $787 billion stimulus package will cost. The 1931 David-Bacon Act (which obviously did nothing to shorten or alleviate the Great Depression) provides that contractors for government construction projects pay a...
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March 14, 2009
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Card Check: Canada Rejects It, We Covet It

EFCA unionization
It's funny--and illustrative--that Democrats in the U.S. have always ached for the liberalism of our northern neighbor, which is one reason why I've been warning on these pages that health care reform, Demo-style, is nothing but a Trojan Horse for socialized medicine a la Canada. However, on one crucial issue, our U.S. liberals are not watching northern affairs closely enough. Canada once had ...
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March 13, 2009
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EFCA Could Unionize Small Businesses

EFCA Employee Free Choice Act small business
The 1935 National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), commonly referred to as the Wagner Act, exempted small businesses from union organization, but the definition of small business has not been updated since 1959. The exemption ends when a small, non-retail business grosses $50,000 in a single year; for retail operations, the figure is $500,000 a year. However, the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) now...
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March 12, 2009
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Dems Looking to Modify the Employee Free Choice Act?

EFCA Employee Free Choice Act
The business-feared, loved-by-unions Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) was introduced in both the House and the Senate on Tuesday. Passage by the House seems a done deal, but in the Senate success hinges on getting 60 votes to choke off a filibuster. With 58 (and potentially 59 with Al Franken) Democratic Senators, invoking cloture wouldn't seem like such a high hurdle, but a handful of Senate D...
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March 12, 2009
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Health Care Reform: How Gurneys Become Beds

emergency rooms ER gurneys health care hospitals
To be frank, I share neither the euphoria nor the enthusiasm that seem to surround the rush to "reform" health care. Of course, the optimistic aura surrounding Obama's push for reform is largely media induced, leaving us little hope that we'll see or read anything to detract from what's going on. My position is that there is no reform of health care going on; there's just a push to get governm...
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