Santorum a Captive of Special (Captive) Interests

By DHinMI

Billmon put up a great piece last week about Rick Santorum introducing a bill that would prohibit the National Weather Service from competing with private companies like The Weather Channel that sell their forecasts to cable companies, web portals and the like.  Billmon then has a little fun at Santorum's expense with a (hopefully) fictionalized account from the near future of a bill introduced by Santorum that would

prohibit the lungs of U.S. citizens from competing with companies such as Air Products Inc., which sell compressed oxygen to hospitals, clinics and other medical institutions. Under the proposed law, Americans would be required to purchase the air they breathe from a commercial vendor rather than inhaling it naturally from the earth's atmosphere.

"We believe this proposal will improve public health by ensuring the nation's lungs are exposed only to pure, 100% industrially manufactured oxygen," explained Mary Byers, executive vice president for Air Products, which just happens to be headquartered in Santorum's home state.

The bill would also force the earth to devote its full attention to absorbing carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases, rather than duplicating products already available from the private sector, Byers added.

I got a good chuckle out of the piece (and it made me wonder if Billmon enjoyed Total Recall).  But it got me wondering, how consistent is Santorum on the issue of government-owned entities competing with the private sector?  In at least one case, Santorum was clearly a captive of special (captive) interests working against private sector employers and employees.

The "special interest" in this case is the federal prison system:

Some businesses benefit from captive audiences; this company benefits from captive employees. Federal Prison Industries (FPI), known by its trade name UNICOR, uses prisoners to make products and provide services, mainly for the US government. More than 19,300 inmates (about 13% of the total eligible inmate population) are employed in more than 100 FPI factories at 71 prisons. UNICOR, which is part of the Justice Department's Bureau of Prisons, manufactures products such as office furniture, clothing, beds and linens, electronics equipment, and eyewear. It also offers services including data entry, bulk mailing, laundry services, printing, recycling, and refurbishing vehicle components.

FPI was created back in 1934, at a time when the federal government, through the alphabet soup of jobs programs, was a major employer as Roosevelt tried to spend and innovate the country out of the depths of the depression.  At the time, the federal government was a fairly modest operation, prisons held a smaller percentage of the overall population, and federal prisons housed a smaller percentage of the incarcerated population. 

Over time, of course, the federal government grew into a major purchaser of goods and services, and FPI became the 36th largest federal contractor, largely because the Department of Defense (DoD) was prohibited from even taking bids from private companies if FPI wanted the contract.  As a result, several industries, most prominently the office furniture industry, were locked out of one of their largest possible markets.  FPI has even talked of trying to compete in the commercial marketplace, which has generated vehement opposition from business groups like the National Federation of Independent Business and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.  In 2001 U.S. Senator Carl Levin of Michigan authored legislation that ended FPI's monopoly over DoD contracts, but only after fending off an amendment by Virginia Senator John Warner that would have retained the FPI's monopoly. 

So, you may ask, how did Rick Santorum, who's concerned with the National Weather Service "competing" with The Weather Channel, vote on an issue important to America's troubled office furniture industry?  Well of course, instead of protecting the jobs of law-abiding American workers, he voted in favor of buying potentially inferior and more expensive products produced by prisoners making less than $2 per hour. 

One of the rationales used to justify FPI's preferred status on federal contracts is that building office furniture in prison teaches the prisoners skills that will help them get a job upon their release.  The problem with that thinking, however, is that office furniture manufacturers like Steelcase have slashed their workforces by over 40% since 2000 as they close plants and ship jobs to Mexico.  It's usually the case that manufacturers move jobs offshore because their American-based operations aren't as cost-efficient as overseas operations where workers are paid prison-level wages.  In this case, Rick Santorum supported the loss of American jobs by making American workers compete with people making prison-level wages here in the United States.

So why would Santorum support the FPI monopoly on DoD contracts but try to eliminate the weather forecasts the National Weather Service provides everyone for free?  Apparently he's against using our tax dollars to produce something that we can all enjoy for no extra cost...unless it can be produced by captive employees. 

Comments

[emptypockets]

To put your ideas to the real test we would need to train a cadre of inmate meteorologists, and then...

[DHinMI]

Well, I think most of the Weathermen are now out of prison...

[Plutonium Page]

I'd like to see Santorum in prison, but his buddy Tom is more likely to be doin' the perp walk.

Thanks for the post DHinMI. I need to check out Billmon more often.

As for the Weathermen, have you seen The Weather Underground? It's a great documentary. Mark Rudd (one of the Weathermen) teaches math at a community college here in Albuquerque. Interesting guy.

[steven davies]

Interesting post.I see that most of the prisoners work in factory which produce home office furniture, clothing, beds and linens, electronics equipment and etc.Good strategy.

[michael jones]

I think that it is very wise dicision to let prisoners work in factory which produce office furniture, home furniture and so on. I support it.

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