South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley (R) is leading the Republican rage against the National Labor Relations Board ever since it filed a complaint against Boeing for moving its operations to her “right to work” state as a retaliation against strikers in Washington state. Threatening to move facilities because of strikes is illegal under the National Labor Relations Act and is the exact reason given by a Boeing executive for the move.

Haley, however, is decrying the NLRB as a “rogue agency” that’s actions are “absolutely un-American.” In a conference call with reporters yesterday, Haley slammed President Obama as a “coward” for failing to take sides on the issue and is insisting that he disband the agency:

“And as we are looking at President Obama to give his speech on jobs, the only thing I want to hear from him, the only thing the people of this country want to hear from him is that he’s going to disband the NLRB or get them to step down from a great American company that chose to do business in South Carolina as opposed to going overseas.” [...]

The South Carolina governor feels so strongly that the independent agency shouldn’t exist that she would even support a decision from the lone Republican member of the NLRB to step down. With the recent departure of NLRB chairman Wilma Leibman, such a resignation from Republican Brian Hayes would reduce the board to just two members — i.e., to less than a quorum.

“Anything that would disband the NRLB, I’d be the biggest cheerleader for,” Haley said.

House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-CA) is also targeting NLRB, having subpoenaed the agency’s documents on the Boeing decision. NLRB, however, cannot release the documents as it wold jeopardize the court case before an administrative law judge in Seattle, Washington.

The NLRB has long been a primary target in the Republican’s comprehensive campaign to undermine the ability of workers to organize and negotiate better working conditions. No matter how hyperbolic her rhetoric, Haley’s goal is no different.

Our guest blogger is Isha Vij, a research assistant with the Economic Policy Team at the Center for American Progress Action Fund.

Since the onset of the current (horribly slow) economic recovery more than two years ago, state and local governments have shed over 600,000 jobs. Compare this to the same point in the recovery for the past three recessions (early 1980s, early 1990s, and early 2000s), where state and local governments created roughly 290,000, 490,000 and 240,000 jobs respectively:

The U.S. has lost over 60 percent of these jobs in our current recovery and will continue to do so unless policymakers start making the necessary public sector investments — such as in education. Continuing to cut state and local budgets has an extremity destructive impact on our recovery efforts.

As Matthew Yglesias explained, “conservatives complain about the results because the President is a Democrat named Barack Obama. But the policy result is what conservatives say they want. Steady cuts to the government sector, offset somewhat by private sector growth.” Contractionary fiscal policy will continue to dampen hiring in the months to come, as funds from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act are now mostly spent and 46 states and the District of Columbia have cut their budgets in the past year. Furthermore, it is estimated 42 states and the District of Columbia will experience significant budget shortfalls in the coming fiscal year, likely resulting in further cuts and even more job losses.

Job losses in state and local governments cause major repercussions to our already slowing economy. Last month’s Gross Domestic Product report showed that state and local government expenditures decreased by 2.8 percent in the last quarter in inflation-adjusted dollars. This is dragging down the recovery and preventing millions of Americans from getting back to work.

Sen. Pat Toomey (r-PA)

Yesterday, Sen. Pat Toomey (R-PA) held a town hall meeting in Coudersport, Pennsylvania and was confronted about corporate tax dodging and why some Republicans are trying to eliminate a payroll tax cut that has helped create jobs.

A man who identified himself as unemployed asked Toomey how it was fair for corporations to avoid paying any taxes and criticized Republicans for suggesting that we eliminate a tax cut for the “working class” (the payroll tax cut). Toomey dodged the question about the payroll tax cut, saying that people don’t pay taxes on their unemployment benefits. He then repeatedly claimed that the United States has the world’s second-highest effective corporate income tax rate:

MAN: So you’re saying that we’re going to run out of money to fund Medicare [...] It again comes back to the tax breaks. The corporations have these big tax breaks, they’re not paying in, the bottom line is I’m still paying taxes. [...] Now, talking about not raising corporations’ taxes, but they also want to stop the federal tax breaks we’re getting now coming out of our paychecks. That comes on the working class.

TOOMEY: We oughta follow up, if you’re paying income taxes on your unemployment benefits, we should talk because that’s the way the tax code works. [...] Let me just illustrate the corporate side of this for just a second. These are not my numbers these are David Walker’s numbers. This is the effective corporate tax rate [...] after all the deductions after all the provisions [...] The United States is 2nd-highest. We are at just below 30 percent. [...] All of our competitors pay less.

Watch it:

The effective tax rate is the rate companies actually pay once all the credits, loopholes, and deductions in the corporate tax code are taken into account. And, as it turns out, the United States does not have the second-highest effective corporate income tax rate in the world. It is unclear what chart Toomey is using to claim this — although it should be noted that the man he cites, David Walker, is part of a larger conservative deficit hawk movement.

The United States actually has a lower effective corporate income tax rate than many other nations in the developed world. The World Bank-International Finance Corporation noted in 2009 that the U.S. has a lower effective corporate income tax rate than nations like Italy, Japan, Canada, and Germany. Even the ultra-conservative Business Roundtable supported a study that found five nations with higher effective corporate tax rates than the U.S.

Far from over-taxing corporations, the United States actually collects the second-lowest share of corporate income taxes as a percentage of GDP as of 2009 among similar competing nations in the OECD:

(HT: CoudyNews YouTube account)

Yesterday, American Banker reported that, even a year after they were busted in the “robo-signing” scandal, the nation’s biggest banks are still fabricating foreclosure documents. (As a reminder, the robo-signing mess involved banks approving thousands of foreclosures without verifying basic information and using fraudulent documents during court cases.) In several instances, banks were attempting to transfer mortgages between financial firms that went out of business years ago.

And as the Associated Press noted today, robo-signing is far from a new practice. In fact, county officials have found robo-signed documents dating back to 1998:

At the time, “robo-signing” was thought to be contained to the affidavits that banks file when a mortgage is issued and somebody buys a house. The documents are used to prove they have the right foreclosure if the homeowner isn’t making mortgage payments. Companies that process mortgages said they were so overwhelmed with paperwork that they cut corners.

But now, as county officials review years’ worth of mortgage paperwork, in some cases combing through one page at a time, they are finding suspect signatures — either signed with the same name by dozens of different people, improperly notarized or signed without a review of the facts in the paperwork — on all sorts of mortgage documents, dating as far back as 1998, The Associated Press has found.

In just one North Carolina county, “a sample of 6,100 mortgage documents filed since 2006 turned up 74 percent with questionable signatures.” We’ve noted previously that 75 percent of mortgage transfers in one Massachusetts county were found to be invalid. Judges in several states have begun throwing out foreclosure cases when banks present robo-signed or otherwise fraudulent documents.

As NASDAQ.com columnist Daniel Pereira wrote, “these reports paint a picture of a banking industry gone completely off the rails (as if that wasn’t common knowledge), cutting corners and flat-out lying about who owns which mortgages, what they’re worth and where they are stored.” Yesterday, the Federal Reserve sanctioned mega-bank Goldman Sachs for its role in the robo-signing mess.

Predictably, Republicans reacted to today’s dismal jobs number — which showed that zero net jobs were created in August — by blaming the supposed avalanche of taxes and regulations put in place by the Obama administration. “Private-sector job growth continues to be undermined by the triple threat of higher taxes, more failed ‘stimulus’ spending, and excessive federal regulations. Together, these Washington policies have created a fog of uncertainty that’s left small businesses unable to hire and American families worried about the future,” said House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) in a statement today.

However, McClatchy conducted a survey of small business and found that they don’t blame taxes or regulations for their hesitancy to hire:

Politicians and business groups often blame excessive regulation and fear of higher taxes for tepid hiring in the economy. However, little evidence of that emerged when McClatchy canvassed a random sample of small business owners across the nation. [...]

McClatchy reached out to owners of small businesses, many of them mom-and-pop operations, to find out whether they indeed were being choked by regulation, whether uncertainty over taxes affected their hiring plans and whether the health care overhaul was helping or hurting their business.

Their response was surprising.

None of the business owners complained about regulation in their particular industries, and most seemed to welcome it. Some pointed to the lack of regulation in mortgage lending as a principal cause of the financial crisis that brought about the Great Recession of 2007-09 and its grim aftermath.

Some small business pointed to the cost of health insurance as holding them back. Others cited a simple lack of customers (consistent with an economic slump caused by lack of demand). “I think the business climate is so shaky that I would not want to undergo any expansion or outlay capital,” said Andy Weingarten, who owns Almar Auto Repair in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Several respondents actually pointed to the 2009 Recovery Act (i.e. the stimulus), which was almost unanimously opposed by Republicans, as helping to boost their businesses. “It allowed those folks to spend and have money and pay for the essentials,” said Rip Daniels, who owns four businesses.

Republicans, however, are continuing to insist on debilitating budget cuts that are not causing the private sector to hire, but that have contributed to an absolute hemorrhaging of jobs in the public sector. Since the official end of the recession, the public sector has lost 600,000 jobs.

According to the latest data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the economy added zero net jobs in August, with the unemployment rate remaining unchanged at 9.1 percent. The private sector added 17,000 jobs, while the public sector continued to shrink, losing 17,000 jobs.

The report includes amongst its losses 45,000 jobs temporarily lost as a result of the Verizon strike. So 45,000 other jobs were created that aren’t reflected in the overall number. But that’s hardly a glimmer of good news.

As The Economist’s Ryan Avent noted, “since the recession officially ended, the American economy has lost nearly 600,000 government jobs. Any way you slice it, that’s a significant drag on recovery.” Matt Yglesias added:

The striking zero result should galvanize minds, but it’s worth noting that this has been the trend all year. The public sector has been steadily shrinking. According to the conservative theory of the economy, when the public sector shrinks that should super-charge the private sector. What’s happened in the real world has been that public sector shrinkage has simply been paired with anemic private sector growth. This is what I’ve called “The Conservative Recovery.” Conservatives complain about the results because the President is a Democrat named Barack Obama. But the policy result is what conservatives say they want. Steady cuts to the government sector, offset somewhat by private sector growth.

Political Correction charted the changes in private sector and public sector employment since the 2009 stimulus was passed:

The Roosevelt Institute’s Mike Konczal added that “the number of hours worked in US economy declined. Same number of hours worked (not controlling for population growth) as March 1999.” 42.9 percent of the unemployed have been out of work for six months or more, while the wider U-6 measure of underemployment stands at 16.2 percent. Next week, President Obama is unveiling a new jobs plan before a joint session of Congress.