Patt Morrison for Wednesday, 9/28/2011

PATT MORRISON SCHEDULE

Wednesday, September 28, 2011

1-3 p.m.

 

CALL-IN @ 866-893-5722, 866-893-KPCC; OR JOIN THE CONVERSATION ONLINE ON THE PATT MORRISON BLOG AT KPCC-DOT-ORG

 

 

1:00 – 1:30

OPEN

 

1:30 – 2:00

Regulation _______s jobs! ProPublica investigates

“Stop job-killing regulations!” is a well represented refrain on Capitol Hill these days. Just last month, President Obama intervened to ask the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to back off its ozone regulations for fear that those “regulatory burdens” would unduly saddle industry in hard times. But a new investigation conducted by ProPublica finds the claim that regulation kills jobs to be unfounded. To begin with, there’s little quantitative research on the subject, but the evidence so far shows that while regulations do destroy some jobs, they create others so that the overall effect isn’t one of “killing” so much as shifting jobs within the economy. But is the shift worth the cost and which regulations make the biggest waves?

 

Guests:

Marian Wang, reporter/blogger for ProPublica

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NOT CONFIRMED – DO NOT PROMOTE THIS GUEST:

Roger Noll, professor of economics, emeritus; co-director,  Program on Regulatory Policy at The Stanford Center for International Development

 

• Says regulation redistributes jobs – some lost, others gained.

 

2:00 – 2:40

Are college athletes taken advantage of? Should they be paid?

In his Atlantic piece “The Shame of College Sports,” Taylor Branch compares college athletes to slaves. He writes, “To survey the corporations and universities enriching themselves on the backs of uncompensated young men, whose status as ‘student-athletes’ deprives them of the right to due process guaranteed by the Constitution, is to catch an unmistakable whiff of the plantation.” Branch argues that the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) scandalizes instances of college athletes receiving SUV’s and tattoos and imposes strict punishments—like mandating that USC’s Reggie Bush return his Heisman for accepting free airfare and limo rides—to cover up the real scandal: that these athletes, a large percentage of whom are African Americans, are being exploited under the guise of “amateurism” and “student-athlete.” In response, the NCAA and the Knight Commsion on Intercollegiate Athletics state that student athletes are getting the most meaningful form of payment: a free, or nearly free, education. They argue that paying student-athletes will corrupt the appeal and purity of college sports and teammate bonds. With millions made from television contracts and athlete likenesses in films and video games, is it fair to keep all profits from the athletes themselves? Or will paying college athletes change the sport for the worst?

 

Guest:

Taylor Branch, author of the Atlantic piece "The Shame of College Sports" and new e-book “The Cartel: Inside the Rise and Imminent Fall of the NCAA.”

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2:40 – 3:00 

How Ronald Reagan’s fight with air traffic controllers forever changed labor relations

In 1981, air traffic controllers at Washington Dulles airport called an illegal strike. Ronald Reagan, who had been in office less than a year, fired the striking workers. After decades of tension between management and air traffic controllers, the strike marked a turning point in labor’s power and influence with the public, according to history professor Joseph A. McCartin. In his new book, “Collision Course,” McCartin chronicles the accidents that led to the foundation of a union for air traffic controllers – and why since the 1981 protest the public tends to criticize striking workers, rather than take up their call to action. 

 

Guest:

Joseph A. McCartin, associate professor of history at Georgetown and author of “Collision Course: Ronald Reagan, the Air Traffic Controllers, and the Strike that Changed America”

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