A Pennsylvania House of Representatives panel on Thursday passed bills to favor apprenticeship-trained labor and pay prevailing wages in state contracting in a process Republicans blasted as illegitimate.
The House Labor and Industry Committee reported both bills to the full chamber, with all 12 Democrats supportive and all nine Republicans opposed.
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The Legislature’s Joint Finance Committee this week jettisoned 545 of liberal Governor Tony Evers’ budget proposals, packed with higher taxes on businesses and individuals and growing government initiatives.
Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce, the state’s largest business advocate, is applauding the Republican-controlled budget-writing committee for trimming Evers’ bigger government budget plan.
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Less than a week after receiving a letter from the Goldwater Institute critical of its “prevailing wage” mandate for contractors, the City of Phoenix repealed the ordinance. The Goldwater Institute said there was “a high risk of litigation,” pointing out to the city that the hurriedly passed law violated A.R.S. 34-321, which prohibits prevailing wage laws.
Goldwater Institute staff attorney John Thorpe said in an article after the victory, “Yesterday’s repeal is good news for businesses, their employees, and all taxpayers — and it’s a reminder that Goldwater will never stop fighting to hold government accountable and to defend Americans’ economic freedom from burdensome, counterproductive regulations.”
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The nonprofit Institute for Reforming Government (IRG) on Friday issued a comprehensive analysis of Democratic Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers’s 2023-25 state budget and bemoaned the proposal’s likely impact on job creators and the middle class.
Evers’s spending plan totals $104 billion, $16 billion more than the budget on which the Badger State now operates. If enacted, the new proposal would be the first state budget exceeding $100 billion. It includes massive spending increases in such areas as public education, childcare assistance, “affordable housing” and broadband expansion. Republican lawmakers, who object to the extent of the spending hikes and the governor’s refusal to devote more of the state’s $7.1 billion surplus to tax cuts, promised last week to thoroughly rewrite the plan.
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A report released Monday by Pennsylvania’s Independent Fiscal Office (IFO) shows that new Keystone-State employment opportunities fell in June, marking a three-month overall decline.
Examining numbers from the federal Department of Labor, the IFO found that around 393,000 new jobs opened in June. Although that number exceeds the 281,000-per-month average for job openings that preceded COVID-19 in 2020, it continues a downward slope that began after new employment offerings reached 514,000 in March.
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Gov. Gretchen Whitmer on Tuesday announced she has reinstated Michigan’s controversial prevailing wage for government contracts.
The state’s prevailing law was repealed by the state legislature in June 2018, during the final year of the administration of Republican Gov. Rick Snyder. Michigan was one of 24 states repealing the prevailing wage practice.
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Saginaw County will not enforce the prevailing wage requirements in its purchasing policy, according to a letter signed by an attorney representing the county.
The updated policy is considered a victory for non-union contractors for government projects, as well as for taxpayers who won’t have to foot the bill for higher union labor costs.
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