‘Jobbing’ America

Below is one section — out of 451 Sections — of the president's American Jobs Act. The internet-accessible pdf. file for this particular piece of proposed legislation totals 155 pages. Read as much as you can stand. My comments below.

SEC. 374. PROHIBITED ACTS. (a) Employers- It shall be an unlawful employment practice for an employer to — (1) publish in print, on the Internet, or in any other medium, an advertisement or announcement for an employee for any job that includes- (A) any provision stating or indicating that an individual's status as unemployed disqualifies the individual for any employment opportunity; or (B) any provision stating or indicating that an employer will not consider or hire an individual for any employment opportunity based on that individual's status as unemployed; or

---

(2) fail or refuse to consider for employment, or fail or refuse to hire, an individual as an employee because of the individual's status as unemployed; (3) direct or request that an employment agency take an individual's status as unemployed into account to disqualify an applicant for consideration, screening, or referral for employment as an employee. (b) Employment Agencies- It shall be an unlawful employment practice for an employment agency to— (1) publish, in print or on the Internet or in any other medium, an advertisement or announcement for any vacancy in a job, as an employee, that includes — (A) any provision stating or indicating that an individual's status as unemployed disqualifies the individual for any employment opportunity; or (B) any provision stating or indicating that the employment agency or an employer will not consider or hire an individual for any employment opportunity based on that individual's status as unemployed. (2) screen, fail or refuse to consider, or fail or refuse to refer an individual for employment as an employee because of the individual's status as unemployed; (3) limit, segregate, or classify any individual in any manner that would limit or tend to limit the individual's access to information about jobs, or consideration, screening, or referral for jobs, as employees, solely because of an individual's status as unemployed. (c) Interference With Rights, Proceedings or Inquiries- It shall be unlawful for any employer or employment agency to — (1) interfere with, restrain, or deny the exercise of or the attempt to exercise, any right provided under this Act; or (2) fail or refuse to hire, to discharge, or in any other manner to discriminate against any individual, as an employee, because such individual — (A) opposed any practice made unlawful by this Act; (B) has asserted any right, filed any charge, or has instituted or caused to be instituted any proceeding, under or related to this Act; (C) has given, or is about to give, any information in connection with any inquiry or proceeding relating to any right provided under this Act; or (D) has testified, or is about to testify, in any inquiry or proceeding relating to any right provided under this Act. (d) Construction - Nothing in this Act is intended to preclude an employer or employment agency from considering an individual's employment history, or from examining the reasons underlying an individual's status as unemployed, in assessing an individual's ability to perform a job or in otherwise making employment decisions about that individual. Such consideration or examination may include an assessment of whether an individual's employment in a similar or related job for a period of time reasonably proximate to the consideration of such individual for employment is job-related or consistent with business necessity.

Two things come immediately to mind. First, as I have stated many times before, progressives are utterly clueless when it comes to human nature. They look at the above provisions and come to the conclusion that the government is their champion, protecting the rights of the unemployed by threatening anyone and everyone who might consider one's employment status as one criterion in the hiring process with litigation. I don't which is dumber: creating yet another subset of ostensibly aggrieved Americans who can sue someone based on the presumption that they weren't hired because they are currently unemployed; or the inevitably unintended consequence that any business faced with potential litigation just for interviewing such people will forego the process completely, and promote someone from within the company. Or, not hire anyone at all. Either way, number of jobs created or saved? A big fat zero. But progressive cluelessness doesn't stop there: another part of this bill provides for yet another year of unemployment insurance. That gets us close to three years of federal benefits one can collect before being required to look for a job. Again, progressives somehow imagine that most people will spend every week of those three years determinedly beating the bushes for employment. Spare me. The overwhelming majority of people will spend virtually the entire three years living off the fat of the taxpayer-underwritten land, and only start looking for a job when the government gravy train gets perilously close to the last stop. In addition, does anyone but a progressive believe that three years of not working will have no effect on someone's job skills? Ergo, progressives, whose economic policies have turned people into long-term wards of the state, want those same people to be able to sue someone else if they "feel" they were discriminated against during a job interview. And according to the president, this is the kind of thinking that will produce another 2.6 million jobs. Good luck with that, my re-distributionist comrades. The second thing that comes to mind is just as important. For those of you who slogged through the above provision, understand that this was one of the clearer sections of the bill. The legalese is most sections of this legislation is so thick, it is more than likely only a handful of Americans could possibly comprehend it. Yet this particular bill is small beer. For perspective's sake, take the length of this bill and multiply it by a factor of ten. What do you get? The Dodd-Frank financial "reform" bill. By a factor of more than twenty? The healthcare bill, in all its mind-numbing, bribe-allocation, "we have to pass it so you can find out what's in it" glory. I've said it before and I'll say it again: the best way to create a totalitarian state is to make the law, not only unknown, but for all practical purposes unknowable. Don't think for a second there is a single legislator in Washington, D.C. who, despite passing them into law, read either of the aforementioned monstrosities. On the other hand, rest absolutely assured that if some arcane provision in either one, or any other government-issued rule or regulation for that matter, can be used to bend the will of a citizen to the power of the state, it will be enforced with vigor. Rest assured that every bill, which has a provision such as Section 1302 of the healthcare bill, granting the Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) the power to "define essential health benefits" turns yet another government bureaucrat into a lord of his or her particular fiefdom. None of this is an accident. It is the ultimate destination of progressive ideology. A progressive ideology which weds the power of the statists to that of their comrades in the legal profession in order to turn America into a legal minefield where even the most law-abiding citizens can be turned into law-breakers if it suits those in positions of power. A jobs bill? More like another assault on what's left of our democratic republic. There's only one job this bill is really trying to save: Barack Obama's White House gig — period.