Comments on: I Can’t Drive 55

By: coffeeguy

coffeeguy — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 14:29:38 +0000

I completely agree with your post. I am located in Georgia and we are an “at will” state. I could not imagine it being any different. It is hard enough to make a decision to fire or hire someone as it is with out having to deal with the legal side of it. However, while it is not always easy it is important that a company be able to restructure itself in order for the greater good. No doubt this amendment if approved would raise hiring and firing costs for companies, and in turn reduce the productivity.

By: Ryan

Ryan — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 11:57:41 +0000

Sam, I agree that there's a host of labor vs. business legislation out there this year, many with conflicting goals, but a patchwork approach like this is rife with problems and serious unintended consequences, and I'm viewing this through the lens of high-techstart-up company formation. Furthermore, all of the businesses I'm involved with are employers where the vast majority of the employees are white-collar and highly paid and have good benefits, health insurance, 401k, etc, so this sort of blanket legislation is problematic and doesn't apply equally to all types of businesses.

It reminds me of Sarbanes-Oxley, put in place after the Enron debacle. SOX has basically created an “employment for life” dynamic with the large accounting firms, has dramatically increased their revenues, and made them more expense or totally unavailable for start-up companies (since they make so much servicing public companies), and had made going public so expensive (SOX compliance costs a company ~$3m/yr) that fewer start-ups can go public. The deep irony here is that it has rewarded the very folks who helped create the mess in the first place, while the benefits SOX offers in terms of more market transparency for investors are somewhat debatable.

By: fronesis

fronesis — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 11:14:01 +0000

I know I'm not a resident…but….

There's a BIG PILE of amendments on the ballot in Colorado that amount to a significant, and perhaps very important for the long-term, confrontation between labor and business. Some would seriously undermine the possibility for labor to organize, and some would give certain powers to workers. I totally see the logic of your opposition to 55, but I'm not certain it's fair to isolate this amendment from all the others and encourage people to 'vote no on 55'.

Again, I understand why 55 might be a bad piece of legislation, one that does more for lawyers than for workers, but what about the other amendments on the ballot that are clearly designed to change Colorado law so as to make it harder for labor to organise?