U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) runs on a $45 billion annual budget — including $5.5 billion in federal stimulus money to oversee capital building projects.
Thanks to President Obama, the federal government is steering that money toward Big Labor patrons with a proven track record of cost overruns, construction delays and corruption.
Executive Order 13502, a union-friendly executive order signed by Obama in his first weeks in office. It essentially forces contractors who bid on large-scale public construction projects worth $25 million or more to submit to union representation for its employees.
The blunt instrument used to give unions a leg up is the “project labor agreement,” which in theory sets reasonable pre-work terms and conditions. But in practice, it requires contractors to hand over exclusive bargaining control, to pay inflated, above-market wages and benefits, and to fork over dues money and pension funding to corrupt, cash-starved labor organizations.
These anti-competitive agreements undermine a fair bidding process on projects that locked-out, nonunion laborers are funding with their own tax dollars.
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