From The Associated Press:

Worker productivity fell this spring more quickly than previously estimated while labor costs were rising at a faster clip. Both developments could pose threats to a fragile economic recovery.

The Labor Department reported Thursday that productivity declined at an annual rate of 0.7 percent in the April-June period, a bigger drop than the 0.3 percent decline reported a month ago. Labor costs rose at an annual rate of 3.3 percent, faster than the 2.4 percent increase originally reported.

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If only they were as determined to cut spending.  Alas, Congressional Democrats are hell-bent on taking care of their friends in the teachers unions.

The original $23 billion “Education Jobs Fund,” or “public schools bailout,” in the words of American Federation of Teachers president Randi Weingarten, fizzled, despite earnest lobbying by both the AFT and the larger National Education Association.

That number was trimmed to $10 billion and inserted into the Afghanistan war spending bill in a cynical maneuver cooked up by Big Labor.

While that passed the House, word is emerging that the pork-laden war bill isn’t going anywhere in the Senate.

But Big Labor’s pals aren’t giving up.  They’re a tenacious bunch that will find one way or another to continue spending oodles more on a bloated system that’s underserving America’s children.

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Amidst polls showing flagging public support, the Obama Administration has decided to address the one poll, among all others, that will determine Obama’s political future: the unemployment rate.  As Scott Rasmussen points out, the unemployment rate has a lot to say in deciding a President’s popularity rating and election results – which is probably why Obama announced he would hold a jobs summit with small business representatives among others.

Speeches and photo-ops, however, won’t change the fact that Obama’s policies are anti-capitalist and therefore anti-job and anti-recovery.

It’s important to note that the secret to capitalism is not all that secret.  It’s right there in the name CAPITALism.   Our system relies on:

• Step 1.  The ability of some to aggregate enough capital, i.e. save money, so that they can . . .
• Step 2.   Invest in productive enterprises, i.e. start or grow businesses which  . . .
• Step 3.   Employ people – people who  . . .
• Step 4.   Have the ability to buy things, i.e. purchasing power (critical in a 70% consumer driven economy) – which in turn  . . .
• Step 5.  Creates profits for sellers and . . .
• Step 6.  Savings – and the cycle renews.

The Left’s political policies, however, are sworn enemies of that simple and effective economic process.

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You may have heard the UPS is in quite the political fight with FEDEX. Though both are package-delivery companies, they’re governed by totally different federal labor rules. As a result, UPS’s workforce is much more heavily unionized than FEDEX’s-and more than twice as expensive.

So now UPS is trying to get FEDEX reclassified under federal law as a way of screwing a competitor. That’s horrendous, but it also makes a sick kind of business sense. And it also reveals the real villain: A government that is big enough to absolutely, positively guarantee it can screw any business. Overnight.

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