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Labor unions in Oregon are taking aim at a new threat to the working man: self-checkout machines.

On Thursday, the Oregon chapter of the AFL-CIO, a federation of unions in the state, submitted the first batch of signatures required to get the Grocery Store Service and Community Protection Act on the 2020 state ballot. The measure would forbid Oregon’s grocery stores from operating more than two self-checkout machines at a time.

“The widescale use of self-checkout machines in our state’s grocery stores is part of a deliberate corporate strategy that relies on automation to reduce labor costs and eliminate jobs,” Oregon AFL-CIO President Tom Chamberlin said in a statement. After the state attorney general drafts an official ballot title for its measure, petitioners will have to collect 112,000 signatures in order to qualify for the state ballot.

The text of the ballot initiative details a number of ills allegedly caused by self-checkout machines.

These include the loss of grocery store jobs, the enabling of underage alcohol purchases, and an increase in “social isolation and related negative health consequences.” The text also mentions difficulties the disabled or elderly sometimes have with operating the machines.

The state’s Bureau of Labor and Industry would be empowered to fine noncompliant stores the equivalent of one day’s salary and benefits for their highest-paid retail clerk. That’s for the first offense; further violations would result in increased fines.

The Willamatte Week reports that the initiative comes in the midst of tense salary negotiations between the grocery store chain Fred Meyer and the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 555, an AFL-CIO-affiliated union that represents grocery store workers in Oregon and Southwest Washington. In late August, the UFCW voted to authorize a strike should negotiations with Fred Meyer break down.

One could interpret this initiative as a way of applying pressure on Fred Meyer during these negotiations. It’s not hard to see why labor organizations would want to effectively require stores to hire more of their members.

That perhaps explains why the public-spirited arguments offered by the Oregon AFL-CIO for their measure are so weak.

For starters, grocery stores continue to maintain a hybrid of self-checkout machines and full-service checkout aisles. Folks who have difficulty operating self-checkout machines or who enjoy bantering with clerks can still opt to have an employee to scan their groceries for them.

And while a reduction in labor costs might be a bad thing for unions, it’s generally good for customers, who reap the benefits of lower prices. These same consumers can then spend the money they save on other products and services, creating more jobs that don’t need to be mandated into existence.

Indeed, the arguments advanced by the Oregon AFL-CIO’s ballot initiative could just have been deployed a century ago to prevent grocery stores from transitioning to modern, human-staffed checkout aisles the group is now trying to preserve. Back in the day, customers had to wait on grocery store staff to assemble their orders for them. The introduction of self-service grocery stores in the early 20th century allowed patrons to stroll the aisles themselves, picking out which goods they wanted. The change saved shoppers and stores time and money, creating the far more convenient stores we know today.

Few would argue that we’d be better off if lawmakers in the 1920s chose to ban self-service grocery stores in an effort to save jobs and prevent “social isolation.” Cracking down on self-checkout machines seems equally foolish.

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A beef between Mississippi lawmakers and producers of meat substitutes may be ending with a satisfactory compromise.

Mississippi passed a law earlier this year that banned labeling plant-based meat substitutes (veggie burgers, etc.) as “meat” or a “meat food product.” This silly state-mandated censorship was an attempt to help protect entrenched agricultural interests from competition. Proponents claimed the law was intended to prevent “confusion,” which is utter nonsense. People are not generally tricked into buying meat substitutes based on food labels, and vegan and vegetarian foods clearly label themselves as such specifically to appeal to those who don’t eat real meat. There was really no pressing reason for the Mississippi lawmakers to get involved, except to satisfy producers of beef, chicken, and pork products at a time where the quality of meatless substitutes is improving and potentially reaching a greater number of customers.

The Institute for Justice, teaming up with the Plant Based Foods Association and a vegan food company called Upton’s Naturals, filed a federal suit in July to block the law, arguing that it violated of the First Amendment rights of businesses such as Upton’s. As institute attorney Justin Pearson noted back in July, “Under the First Amendment, businesses should be able to use almost any word they want, as long as consumers understand what they are saying. People know that vegan burgers do not come from cows. That is why they are called ‘vegan.'”

Today the Institute of Justice announced what appears to be a successful end to the fight. The Mississippi Department of Agriculture has withdrawn the regulations it proposed to enforce the law and introduced a new set of regulations. Under the new proposal, it’s still wrong for a plant-based food product to be labeled as “meat” or a “meat food product,” but there will be exceptions for products that include an appropriate qualifying term on the label, such as “plant-based,” “meatless,” “vegetarian,” or “vegan.”

So terms like “veggie burgers” or “meatless bacon” will be allowed on labels in Mississippi. Upton’s Naturals can still sell its seitan “Classic Burger“—seitan is a wheat gluten meat substitute—as long as the label also makes it clear it’s not beef.

“The new proposed regulation is a victory for the First Amendment and for common sense,” Pearson said in a statement today. “Mississippi has made the wise decision to change those regulations so that companies will be free to continue selling vegan and vegetarian burgers and other meat alternatives in the Magnolia State.”

If the proposed regulations are adopted (there’s a 25-day period for the Department of Agriculture to accept comments), the institute, Upton’s, and the Plant Based Foods Association will consider dropping their federal lawsuit.

And there’s more good news on the horizon for anyone who’s been looking to make the shift away from real meat but doesn’t want to miss the flavor: At the end of July, the Food and Drug Administration approved the sale of Impossible Burger meat directly to consumers at supermarkets. Starting later this fall, you will no longer have to go to restaurants to get them; you’ll be able to bring them home and craft your own recipes. I’ve had one myself, and yeah, beef producers should maybe be just a little bit worried.

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By erecting tariffs and threatening to tear up trade agreements, President Donald Trump has done more to achieve one of the left’s longstanding policy goals than any other modern president.

For the Democrats running for office in 2020, this creates a conundrum: They can’t say they like what Trump is doing, but they’re also not really willing to criticize his trade war. In fact, many of the 2020 Democratic candidates are espousing protectionist views that sound a lot like what Trump was saying in 2016.

The Democrats are essentially arguing that all we need is a more competent protectionist in the White House. But there’s no way to “correctly” implement policies that stop individuals from peacefully exchanging goods and services, just because they live in different countries. Whether imposed by Trump or by Bernie Sanders, these ideas are a catastrophe for all Americans.

Written by Eric Boehm. Produced and edited by Mark McDaniel.

Photos:
Allison Dinner/ZUMA Press/Newscom
Kevin Dietsch/CNP/AdMedia/SIPA/Newscom
Paul Kitagaki Jr./ZUMA Press/Newscom

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Federal and state investigators have identified a common element in many of the cases where people have suffered respiratory illnesses after vaping. The Washington Post reports that tests by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) found vitamin E acetate, an oil-based nutritional supplement, in 10 of 18 THC fluids used by patients, while a New York state laboratory found “very high levels of vitamin E acetate in nearly all” the cannabis extracts it tested. That substance was not found in any of the nicotine e-fluid tested by the FDA or the lab.

These findings reinforce the suspicion that the respiratory illnesses reported to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)—215 at last count—are caused largely by additives or contaminants in black-market THC products. Illegal nicotine products may also have played a role in some of these cases, although so far the CDC and the FDA have not identified a common element in patients who vaped nicotine. Notwithstanding attempts to blame these illnesses on the use of legal nicotine products, there is no evidence that standard e-cigarettes are causing the patients’ symptoms. That insinuation was always implausible, given that e-cigarettes have been in wide use for years and these conditions were reported only recently.

While vitamin E acetate is safe to consume orally as a nutritional supplement, it is potentially dangerous when inhaled. As the Post explains, citing Bryn Mawr chemist Michelle Francl, “When that vapor cools down in the lungs, it returns to its original state at that temperature and pressure, she said, which means ‘it has now coated the inside of your lungs with that oil.'” That observation is consistent with reports from Utah of lipoid pneumonia, a rare condition caused by fat particles in the lungs, in patients who had vaped cannabis extracts.

“Vitamin E acetate is not an approved additive for New York State Medical Marijuana Program-authorized vape products and was not seen in the nicotine-based products that were tested,” the New York State Department of Health said in a press release issued yesterday. “As a result, vitamin E acetate is now a key focus of the Department’s investigation of potential causes of vaping-associated pulmonary illnesses. Vitamin E acetate is a commonly available nutritional supplement that is not known to cause harm when ingested as a vitamin supplement or applied to the skin. However, the Department continues to investigate its health effects when inhaled because its oil-like properties could be associated with the observed symptoms.”

Assuming that vitamin E acetate is the culprit in many of these cases, it is clearly not a complete explanation, since it was not detected in all of the fluids vaped by patients. The FDA and the CDC are still trying to figure out which other agents may be causing the respiratory illnesses.

In states that have reported what patients were vaping, Boston University public health professor Michael Siegel notes, the vast majority of cases have involved THC oil: all 21 cases in California, all eight cases in New Mexico, and 24 of 27 cases in Wisconsin. But despite the evidence implicating black-market THC products, public health officials are continuing to issue general warnings about “vaping” and “e-cigarettes,” implying that all such products are equally dangerous. “In their zeal to demonize e-cigarettes,” Siegel writes, “the CDC and other health agencies have put the lives of our nation’s youth at risk.”

The risk is twofold. First, without specific information about the potential hazards of black-market THC oil, people may continue to use those products. Second, people who have switched from combustible cigarettes to e-cigarettes may switch back, even though smoking is indisputably much more dangerous, while smokers who had been considering a switch to e-cigarettes may decide to continue smoking. Both of those choices increase the risk of respiratory illnesses, along with the litany of other diseases caused by smoking. You might think that government officials who claim to be promoting public health would recognize those hazards.

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