Exercising such authority, of course, would require an enormous federal policing force, perhaps in the thousands. Already, employers, in their long-standing voluntary programs to make their plants safer, scratch hard for qualified safety experts. Labor Secretary W. Willard Wirtz blandly explained to Congressmen that getting people would be no drawback. He said he could staff his safety policing team with the hard-core unemployed. These presumably would then show up as federal ‘inspectors’ armed with power of life or death over your business.
The Labor Secretary would wield power over every aspect of these businesses….The act also opens the doors for the labor Secretary to: Rewrite local building codes, Revise local fire regulations, Cancel any professional football game should he decide, say, that tag football would be safer and healthier than tackle.
The new regulations would crown the Secretary as a virtual safety czar. He would have power to decree what is safe and healthy in any private business. He could shut down a machine or an entire plant if he detects ‘imminent harm.’
The principal of equal pay for equal work sounds…simple [but]….We cannot ignore the variables inherent in our private enterprise system, or give all discretion in resolving them to some single group or agency such as the Department of Labor, if we are to continue as free men and women.
It would give the Secretary of Labor vast new powers over private industry with authority to investigate complaints, conduct hearings, issue orders, regulations and interpretation, and initiate legal actions to enforce complaints. Moreover, it would project Government into the job evaluation process—a prerogative traditionally reserved to management.
[The bill would ensure] ‘Another vast Federal bureaucracy’ with an annual budget beginning at more than $1 million and the addition of 240 employees to Uncle Sam’s payroll. The organization suggests the ladies pursue their crusade through the collective bargaining process, rather than through legislation.
…these bills grant extensive powers to the Secretary of Labor which permit of arbitrary application. For in proceeding under the law, the conclusion of the Secretary of Labor could not be upset by the courts, even if a company could prove that the jobs were not comparable, as long as the Secretary could show any substantial evidence that they were comparable.
…the Secretary of Labor becomes prosecutor, judge, and legislator. He is given extensive authority to intervene and interfere in employer-employee relations. He must build a considerable Federal division of his Department to accomplish this purpose at increased cost to the taxpayers….Further, the Secretary is not required to await the complaint of an aggrieved employee. He is empowered to prevent any person from engaging in the prohibited wage discrimination. He may proceed on his own motion. There is not limit to the interference with efficient operations or the amount of snooping which may result in an effort to uncover evidence concerning existing or possible future wage discrimination.
…the passage of Federal legislation will add an unnecessary additional Federal bureaucracy and the inherent added enforcement expense will only increase the already large deficit in the Federal budget. State action and voluntary employer activity have done an excellent job in the area of equal pay to date, and we are optimistic that such activity will proceed at an even faster pace in the future.
Certain specific provisions of these bills are bound to result in extensive governmental intervention in employer-employee relations….These terms ‘comparable character’ and ‘comparable skills’ do not necessarily mean the same job. In fact, they are so general and so vague as to give an administrator a grant of power which could destroy the sound wage structure which many industrial companies have worked for years to perfect.
