Conservatives tend to imply that they believe more in family values than anyone else. It always struck me as odd since the politicians they support never see to have family values as their driving force. Texas Republicans are showing their love for corporations over their citizen’s well-being once again.
We know that America has one of the highest per capita income in the entire world. We are a rich country, and the investment class has always done well, exceeding the population at large. Why then are Republicans so much against across-the-board policies that support families?
Case-in-point is a recent bill reported by the Austin American-Statesman.
It should be up to Texas employers — and not local politicians — to decide what benefits they offer their workers, Gov. Greg Abbott said Tuesday in a speech to an association of small business owners.
Having a city or county government create local regulations for employee benefits creates “a patchwork quilt of regulations” that drive up the cost of doing business, Abbott told members of the National Federation of Independent Business.
The governor said he will back the Consistent Employment Regulations Act — a measure filed Tuesday by Sen. Brandon Creighton, R-Conroe, and Rep. Craig Goldman, R-Fort Worth — that would ban local governments from regulating employee benefits.
“Paid sick leave, for a lot of businesses, is a great strategy,” Abbott said in his speech for NFIB-Texas’ Small Business Day. “It can be a recruiting tool that some businesses use to attract employees to go work for them, but it should be exactly that. It should be an option chosen by the business based upon their strategy of what they want to do, as opposed to a government mandate.”
NFIB’s Texas policy agenda includes fighting “progressive labor causes,” like paid sick leave and $15 minimum wage, according to the group’s priority list. Its top Texas priority is passing tax reform measures and legislation that regulates private employer’s business practices such as hiring, scheduling and employee benefits.
Sen. Donna Campbell, R-New Braunfels, filed a similar measure Tuesday to ban cities and counties from regulating employment benefits, including sick leave, holidays and vacations.
If you believe in families then you would not want to restrict laws that forces corporations to provide pro-family benefits. One of the reasons one wants this at the governmental level is to create a level playing field. If there is no law then a race to the bottom begins. If a fast food company wanted to be benevolent they could lose business to another who could undercut their prices because they treated their employees less generously.