-By Bret Jacobson

We have long known — and long documented — the heavy costs associated with the misnamed Employee Free Choice Act. These costs include the sacrifice of important principles, such as workers’ rights to choose in a free and fair election whether to join a union, and the right for employees to get a vote on their contract terms (rather than have a federal bureaucrat impose them on workers and small business).

But the costs are much more direct than that. We have long hosted the study by Dr. Anne Layne-Farrar, which found that the economic toll of EFCA would include job decreases ranging from 600,000-5 million. Now, the American Enterprise Institute has taken out its calculator and best estimates in a new study, which finds:

If the EFCA returns unionization rates to 1970s levels, it could reduce economy- wide employment and gross domestic product by close to 4 percent. This translates to about 4.5 million jobs lost and over $500 billion in lost output and income. Job loss resulting from EFCA will tend to fall disproportionately on workers with relatively low levels of education and skills. Ironically, these are the very workers the proposed legislation is intended to help.

The one thing worse than just killing jobs in this economy would be to attack the engine of job growth, which is small business. But lo and behold, AEI finds:

EFCA will be particularly costly to small businesses, which typically start out with small profit margins, face high initial failure rates, and are less likely to have specialized human resources staff to deal with labor disputes and union organization. Between 2003 and 2006, 84 percent of new union certification elections were held at companies with less than 100 employees.

The Congress has yet to officially kill EFCA and card check “compromises” are still floated routinely in the hallways and smallways of power. The longer these concepts are allowed to fester, the longer millions of jobs and small businesses are under threat.

(Originally posted at TheTruthAbouttheEFAC.com)

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