Posted by
WashACE Blog
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
Not Taking Boeing for Granted
Posted by Richard S. Davis on 4/22/2009 1:14:00 PM
In Washington, Boeing faces higher unemployment insurance costs,
regulatory costs and labor strife — four strikes in recent years with
202 days of lost work.
Brunell notes that this year's Legislature has not only failed to improve our competitive position, but in several cases threatens to take us backward.
Take unemployment insurance:
... the Deloitte study recommends reducing employers' unemployment
insurance costs to be more in line with competing states. State
lawmakers reformed unemployment insurance costs in 2003 to convince
Boeing to assemble the 787 in Washington, but later reneged on many of
those key reforms. Currently, Washington's unemployment insurance costs
are among the highest in the nation. But instead of lowering them, some
key lawmakers in Olympia are pushing bills backed by union leaders to
increase unemployment benefits and allow workers who voluntarily quit
their jobs to receive full benefits.
And workers' compensation:
For the past 100 years, workers' compensation claims have been handled
in an informal administrative process that doesn't involve trial
lawyers. The employer works with an employee's doctors to manage the
injured worker's treatment and eventual return to work. But the new law
bans employers from speaking to injured workers' doctors once an appeal
is filed. As a result, employers — and often workers — will be forced
to hire attorneys for the more formal and time-consuming process of
taking depositions, and as the delays drag on, legal costs pile up ...
Read the whole column.
Jerry Cornfield in the Herald of Everett reports that the House voted last night to approve an aerospace training institute but balked at endorsing the governor's proposed aerospace training council. If we get UI, workers' compensation, and labor relations wrong, last night's legislation won't make much difference in a cost-sensitive global competition to land good aerospace jobs.
PermaLink
|
