Vaccine Mandate Enforcement Threatens To Trigger Another Economic Crisis

Vaccine mandate enforcement threatens to trigger another economic crisis

Harry Wilmberding

President Joe Biden announced a vaccine mandate on Sept. 9, causing experts to debate the potential economic impact of the rule.

Biden directed the Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) to create a rule requiring businesses with 100 or more employees to require that employees get vaccinated or undergo weekly testing.

The new mandate would affect roughly 100 million Americans, specifically private employees, health care workers and federal contractors who have yet to receive a vaccine, the Daily Callerreported.

“We’re going to protect vaccinated workers from unvaccinated co-workers,” Biden said when introducing the mandate, the Daily Caller reported. “We’ll reduce the spread of COVID-19 by increasing the share of the workforce that’s vaccinated in business all across America.”

The mandate announcement came as the nation grappled with a 5.2% unemployment rate and roughly 10.9 million available jobs, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Some experts believe that the new rule will hurt the jobs market, delivering a blow to the economy, while others suggest that controlling the virus, especially the delta variant, is the key to economic recovery.

“We are already in an unprecedented labor market right now, and this mandate on private employers adds insult to injury because companies are already facing severe labor shortages,” Rachel Greszler, a research fellow at the Heritage Foundation, told the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Employers will also be impacted, as they will need to fire workers who refuse the vaccine or risk a large fine and possibly a lawsuit, Greszler explained.

Greszler sees healthcare, public safety and retail as industries that will suffer the worst from the mandate. Companies like Target have started offering higher pay and more bonuses and benefits to retain employees.

Unions, who often lean left, have expressed frustration with the new mandate, Greszler added.

A group of unions from Montgomery County, Maryland, referred to a county bill requiring government employees to receive a vaccine as an “outrageous intrusion,” according to a press release.

“The council is overstepping its authority with this bill in an attempt to direct the workforce,” the local union groups, including those of the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union, Fraternal Order of Police and the International Association of Fire Fighters, said in the press release.

The Montgomery County Executive Marc Elrich criticized the bill, saying “This brinkmanship legislation is not smart policy. It will lead to staffing shortages, diminish public safety, additional financial costs to our taxpayers, and time-consuming legal entanglements,” according to an official statement.

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