The morning news brought the startling revelation that the newly elected head of Pennsylvania’s largest teacher union (PSEA) has a certification to teach economics. Two questions come to mind immediately: what kind of economics is he certified to teach and does it bear any resemblance to real economics?
Bear in mind that the first principle of economics is the law of scarcity. The first principle of unions is to ignore the law of scarcity. Any student with a knowledge of Economics 101 sufficient to get a B grade in the course can tell you that wage rates are a price and that competitive markets for labor are the efficient and best way to allocate labor and determine wages. He would also know that wage rates in different occupations and industries must reflect worker productivity and the price of the product being and sold.
The objective of unions is to do away with market forces and ignore the role of supply and demand. The results, as we have seen, have been catastrophic for U.S. industries such as steel and autos. Now with the Obama administration becoming the heavy-handed advocate in chief for unions, their ability to wreak havoc on the economy is being renewed and the impact on our ability to grow curtailed. When the head of the AFL-CIO is the President’s leading economic advisor, the nation is in serious trouble.
Moreover, and to our great misfortune, in the public sector, where the new PSEA head operates, the forces of international competition can play no countervailing role in suppressing the destructive force of rapacious unionism. Many government services are monopolies that cannot be outsourced. So when unions enter the picture with incessant demands for compensation, favorable work rules and endless grievance procedures, government services become more expensive and are of lower quality than they would otherwise be.
In light of union antagonism to the laws of economics, one must wonder; just what was the nature of the economics covered by the PSEA head’s economic certification?