> Wall Street Journal - July 6, 2006
>
> Wal-Mart Tax Fizzle
>
> For anyone keeping score, AFL-CIO President John Sweeney has been
> striking out in a surprising number of state capitals. Mr. Sweeney
> launched a campaign in 33 states several months ago to force Wal-Mart
> and other retailers either to spend more on health care or pay more
> in taxes. His legislation was intended as a first step in mandating
> employer-provided health care, and his campaign began as Maryland
> enacted the first "Wal-Mart tax."
>
> Well, the early results are in, and the Sweeney tax has been a
> political flop. Not a single state has followed Maryland's lead, even
> liberal Rhode Island. In 26 states from Maine to New Mexico, so-
> called "fair share" legislation has either stalled or, in the case of
> Kansas, Louisiana and Missouri, been withdrawn. With many state
> legislatures wrapping up their work or already adjourned for the
> year, it's clear the anti-Wal-Mart groundswell isn't coming.
>
> New York was one of the last holdouts, and Long Island's Suffolk
> County has enacted its own version of the law. But for a state in
> which unions enjoy broad political influence, the bill found few
> friends in Albany and failed. Even Attorney General Eliot Spitzer
> opposed it, telling the New York Post that the Wal-Mart bill is not
> the "comprehensive reform" of health care the state needs. A
> candidate for Governor such as Mr. Spitzer has to worry about job
> creation, especially in a state from which young people and jobs are
> both fleeing.
>
> This isn't what Mr. Sweeney hoped when he vowed at the National Press
> Club in January that, "If they don't give us a fair health plan
> covering all families in all 50 states, we will give them hell in all
> 50 states." The AFL-CIO had twisted enough arms in Maryland to enact
> a law requiring employers with 10,000 or more employees to spend at
> least 8% of their payroll on health care or pay the state the
> difference. That law applies to only one company, Wal-Mart.
>
> The Retail Industry Leaders Association, a trade group, is suing to
> overturn Maryland's Wal-Mart tax on the grounds that it violates the
> Constitution's equal protection clause and is pre-empted by federal
> law regulating health benefits. Oral arguments in the case were heard
> recently in U.S. District Court in Baltimore. And arguments will be
> heard in a separate case challenging Suffolk County's law later this
> year in Brooklyn. Win or lose in court, the Wal-Mart tax has already
> fizzled as a political cause.
> ___________________________________
> http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk