Rolling the Big Apple Down the Slippery Slope of Socialized Healthcare

It appears that the diseased thinking suffered by Maryland's state legislature (earlier lamented here) has metastasized from Annapolis to Albany.

New York State is about to become involved in the effort to force Wal-Mart and other big box stores to contribute to their employees' health care tab.

Less than two weeks after Maryland made history by passing a law with the same mission - and on the heels of a similar bill approved by the New York City Council - Democrats in the state Senate plan to introduce a version of such legislation. Democrats passed the Maryland and council measures over Republican vetoes.

New York is in an even worse position to pull this stunt than Maryland.  Maryland does already have a less business friendly climate than neighboring Delaware and Virginia, and so can't afford to be alienating economic engines like Wal-Mart.  But compared to New York's punitive corporate tax structure (49th out of 50 by many measures), Maryland is a pro-business paradise.

Add to that the fact that New York City's relationship with its large corporate residents has been tenuous at best ever since 9/11 - when employers suddenly realized that geographic diversification away from terrorist bullseyes might outweigh the cachet and convenience of a New York address - and you've got all the makings for another corporate exodus.  Even if any copycat legislation enacted in New York State is as targeted as the Maryland law that managed only to impact Wal-Mart, adopting new and unfriendly policies toward the state's most valued engines of creation simply defies any semblance of logic.

Not only would this frankly unAmerican, pseudosocialist move serve as a stark disincentive for employers to move to, incorporate in, or remain in New York State, but it would also have strongly negative implications for the workforce it would presume to protect, and indeed the welfare (small w) of the state on the whole.  Without question, the woeful impact would involve higher unemployment, less real income growth, and a smaller, more stagnant tax base.

Thankfully, Democrats don't have a supermajority (nor any kind of majority for that matter) in the New York State Senate like they do in Maryland, so this asinine twaddle would hopefully be quashed by Governor Pataki if enough Senators were to find themselves sufficiently relieved of their faculties and good sense as to actually pass this legislation.

Maryland is a great and lovely state, no doubt.  But this is one area where we don't want to emulate the Old Liners.  We're already plagued by enough of the specter of socialized healthcare, thanks to the sensibilities of our junior U.S. Senator.

Previously:

With Legislatures Like These, Who Needs Unions?