Tuesday, June 14, 2011

On warped incentives

Chris nicely highlights the Cons' stunningly quick resort to back-to-work legislation after a mere day of Air Canada's CAW strike, at a point where there's been little if any impact on anybody.

But it's worth noting as well how it is that such legislation will indeed serve as an attack on workers: in effect, Air Canada and other federally-regulated employers will lose virtually any trace of incentive to bargain reasonably if they can count on having their preferred outcome imposed by statute whether or not legislation is even remotely needed. And Canadians who recognize that there's a fundamental problem with removing any motivation for institutions to deal reasonably with workers (or indeed anybody else) will have every reason for concern that the Cons are choosing such an unnecessary outcome out of spite toward workers.

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