The bombing of the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001 has shown that freedoms are hard to keep and a nation and people must always be on guard to protect them. While seemingly world’s apart, the situation here is no different when taking the long arm of government into account.

� A bit of recent history.

In this country in the 1970’s a group of “freedom fighters” who became known as the Dissident Eight, left the government of the day to form a new party. They did this, it is said, to escape the yoke of absolute control being exercised over their right to an opinion.

Much has changed since then, and in 1992 the party of the “freedom fighters” was elected. Because of policies that encouraged Foreign Direct Investment the economy grew at levels like never before. In fact, the Minister of Economic Development was quoted in The Tribune, Business Section of Friday, September 14, 2001 as saying:

“One of the things that’s unheralded in this country over the past several years is the fact that at the lower income levels there has been a 20 per cent shrinkage in the lowest income bracket, and the middle to upper income areas have actually swollen by this same 20 per cent. We have had a fluid movement from one category to an upper level. This is a reflection of the fact that people are earning better incomes and usually that translates into more savings and investments.”

The IEF supports these comments. However, when it presented a study of similar evidence about America, it was suggested that models from other countries do not necessarily have the same results here. It is refreshing to read the Minister’s comments that in fact this has happened.

It is also instructive to note that policies of more government control create the opposite effect…people move to lower income levels.

� Welcome to the 21st Century.

Unfortunately, the same government that cleared the way for investment and economic growth is finding itself implementing laws that have been tested in other nations without success. Laws that chased investment away, thereby creating economic difficulties for the very people the laws are supposedly designed to help.

A case in point is the compendium of legislation called “the labour bills.”

After about eighteen months and several drafts of the Employment Act, the government took several hours of consultation, albeit at the last moment, and many of the onerous clauses that would have tied the hands of business were muted. This made the Bill less harmful but still not desirable.

� A new Fascism?

A decidedly different approach appears to be in process with the Minimum Wages and the Health and Safety at Work Acts. This approach was described by Ayn Rand in her 1965 lecture titled The New Fascism: Rule By Consensus.

Ms. Rand stated that Capitalism was facing a new dilemma. Governments would no longer take businesses over as the Socialists and Communists had. They would respond like the Fascists and control virtually every aspect of the business.

This approach is evident in the Minimum Wages and the Health and Safety at Work Acts of 2001. Specifically, the Inspector corps and tri-partite commissions being established will allow unnecessary state intrusion compounding the already destabilising forces of a slowing economy, a major Bay Street fire and the new terrorism unleashed on the world.

The important question is why a governing party, supposedly founded on individualism and freedom from oppression, would want to jeopardise the economic benefits freer market policies helped create?

� An unlikely conundrum?

The Employment Act repeals numerous Bills that have been on the books for years and replaces them with a single law. However, with the implementation of the Minimum Wages and the Health and Safety at Work Acts we will see more government control through regulations. It appears a government has finally found a way to make less equal more!

It is often said that government has to make policies like these because of the constant cry that business takes advantage of the worker. Well…with the continual encroachment of government, there will be fewer business people and more unemployment, placing people in a worse position than they are today. There are numerous examples throughout history of the failure of completely controlled economies. Governments installed such economic systems because it was thought an “ideal world” could be created.

This is the case with the Minimum Wages and Health and Safety at Work Acts expected to be rushed through Parliament in the near future. To paraphrase Sir Winston Churchill: Capitalism might be the unequal sharing of wealth, but more government control is the equal sharing of miseries.

Workers do not need to learn this hard lesson.

The Institute for Economic Freedom