Federal Regulations Work Overtime To Kill American Prosperity: New at Reason

New federal regulations are going to make it more difficult for Americans to work, on the books.

J.D. Tuccille writes:

Responses to tight rules often take the form of simply ignoring them. A 2011 Reuters article on Italy’s economy noted that the country’s high taxes and intrusive red tape had driven many entrepreneurs, laborers, and established companies partially or entirely underground. Among the responses to labor regulations were “companies that violate rules by paying overtime off the books.”

“The most influential factors on the shadow economy and/or shadow labor force are tax policies and state regulation, which, if they rise, increase both,” commented economist Friedrich Schneider of the Johannes Kepler University of Linz, Austria, just a year later.

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