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IS TRUMP REALLY PRO-WORKER?

Even though Donald Trump is a flamboyant billionaire, many blue-collar voters embraced him as the presidential candidate who would lift them out of their economic rut. “I will bring jobs back and get wages up,” Mr. Trump said last summer, vowing to get tough on trade, Mexico and China.

But this Labor Day, his first while in office, it remains unclear whether Mr. Trump’s initiatives have done much to help workers, whether blue-collar or any other collar. It is clear, however, that he has taken several steps that will hurt workers, most notably his decisions to delay, weaken or erase Obama-era workplace regulations. For instance, his administration has postponed rules that protect workers from dangerous silica dust and beryllium.

Mr. Trump has repeatedly trumpeted actions he has taken to help workers. He has withdrawn from the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership trade pact that he said would clobber American factory workers, he has moved to crack down on imported steel and aluminum, and he has boasted that coal mines are reopening and factories expanding thanks to him. In one of his proudest moments, he flew to Indianapolis to announce that he had persuaded the Carrier Corporation not to ship 1,100 factory jobs to Mexico.

Many of Mr. Trump’s moves to help workers have come with a serious downside. He has given green lights to the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines, which will help create a few thousand construction jobs — although environmentalists protest that the pipelines will hasten global warming by increasing America’s reliance on fossil fuels. His threats to place tariffs on steel and aluminum imports might restore some jobs in those industries, but they could spur Chinese or European retaliation against other American industries, costing jobs. Moreover, any tariffs on steel and aluminum could harm industries — like automobiles and appliances — that use these metals, reducing employment there as well.

Mr. Trump has made reviving the coal industry his crusade. “I happen to love the coal miners,” he said in June. To that end, he has pulled out of the Paris climate accord, is seeking to scrap rules against coal-fired power plants and allowed the dumping of coal waste in streams.

Environmentalists warn that these moves will accelerate global warming and despoil coal country, and many economists predict that these moves will add few coal jobs. Coal-mining employment peaked at more than 800,000 in the 1920s and has slid to around 50,000 — one-eighth the number of Home Depot jobs — largely because of more efficient mining technologies and the increased use of cleaner energy substitutes like natural gas, solar and wind.

Mr. Trump also claimed credit for the opening of the Corsa coal mine in Pennsylvania, even though the company began digging that mine two months before the election. Statements like that form a pattern for Mr. Trump. Last January he said he was responsible for Ford’s decision to cancel construction of a Ford Focus factory in Mexico and expand jobs in Michigan (to build electric and self-driving cars). Ford said those moves were made because of market conditions, and undercutting Mr. Trump, the company announced in June that it would build the Focus in China.

Carrier workers are grateful to Mr. Trump, but many note that fewer jobs are being saved than he said. In exchange for Indiana’s providing $7 million in tax breaks, Carrier promised to keep 800 of 1,200 jobs it had planned to move to Mexico. But the Indianapolis plant has announced plans to lay off 600 workers, whose jobs are still moving to Mexico. And even though it was the target of Mr. Trump’s angry tweets, Rexnord, a ball-bearing manufacturer, is still moving 300 jobs from Indianapolis to Mexico.

Mr. Trump repeatedly derided the levels of job creation under President Barack Obama, vowing to increase them by eliminating “job-killing regulations.” But the pace of job creation under Mr. Trump — 170,000 a month — is slightly less than during Mr. Obama’s last six months in office.

Business has enthusiastically applauded Mr. Trump for taking a hatchet to Obama-era regulations. Mr. Trump has signed legislation scrapping a rule requiring federal contractors to disclose wage, safety and workplace discrimination violations — a regulation based on the notion that sunlight acts as a deterrent. His administration has indicated it will dilute an Obama regulation that would make four million more workers qualify for overtime pay. His Labor Department has also signaled it will weaken or kill the “fiduciary rule,” which requires Wall Street to act in the best interests of workers and retirees in managing retirement funds.

Randel K. Johnson, senior vice president of the United States Chamber of Commerce for labor issues, praised Mr. Trump for rolling back workplace regulations, saying they would have cost businesses billions of dollars. Saying it’s not unusual for a new president to rethink his predecessor’s rules, Mr. Johnson said, “These initiatives are going to allow employers to spend money on more productive investments, and that’s going to benefit workers.”

Both business and labor approve of Labor Secretary Alexander Acosta’s push to expand apprenticeships — important job-training routes — to increase mobility and wages for those who don’t go to college. Meanwhile, labor groups are criticizing Mr. Trump’s plan to chop Labor Department spending by 20 percent, including cuts to its job-training programs.

Mr. Trump’s proposed budget would hurt coal miners in numerous ways. It would cut money for mine safety enforcement and eliminate funding for the Appalachian Regional Commission, which has aided hundreds of coal counties by financing job retraining and social services, helping to cut Appalachia’s poverty rates nearly in half.

Mr. Trump promised to spend $1 trillion on infrastructure, a move that unions liked because it would create hundreds of thousands of middle-class jobs. But labor leaders are disappointed that the president’s infrastructure plans have stalled. They also complain that Mr. Trump has shown no interest in raising the minimum wage and has appointed numerous anti-union officials. And they’re waiting to see what he does on Nafta, beyond talking tough.

Janice Bellace, an industrial relations expert at the Wharton School, voiced alarm that the Trump administration seems far more concerned about the loss of several thousand coal jobs than what she sees as a far bigger threat: the prospect that automation, artificial intelligence and robots, such as self-driving cars and trucks, will wipe out millions of jobs.

“One would hope the government would be looking at this very closely so we are prepared for the big changes ahead,” Ms. Bellace said. But, she noted, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin has said that this isn’t something he’s worried about. Clearly, Mr. Trump isn’t worried about it either.
-NY TIMES, September 2, 2017
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/02/opinion/sunday/is-trump-really-pro-worker.html?action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=opinion-c-col-left-region®ion=opinion-c-col-left-region&WT.nav=opinion-c-col-left-region&_r=0