The market basket, revisited

Back at the end of April I did a post called “The market basket” where I compared the local grocery store prices. In that post, I noted that I would continue this on a semi-regular basis, and since six months has elapsed I decided to revisit the stores and see how they stack up.

In the interim the Salisbury area has lost a store (the Giant at North Pointe) and plans are afoot to build a Food Lion in Crisfield. If this pans out, the residents of Crisfield will have the next-best option behind Wal-Mart insofar as price goes, and given the distance between Crisfield and Pocomoke, it may be very competitive as long as they hold the Salisbury stores’ prices for the new location.

As a total food bill of the 20 items selected, here’s how the stores compare. (Individual items can be found here on this Word Perfect document.)

Wal-Mart $42.21 (up 0.9% from April)
Food Lion $50.56 (down 3.3% from April)
Giant $55.61 (down 0.3% from April)
Super Fresh $60.40 (up 5.9% from April)

Obviously, a lot of this depends on how many sale prices were in effect in April vs. October (my shopping date was October 29, I just held this for post-election posting.) But the trend has been prices staying pretty much the same over the six month period (except for Super Fresh), which is good news for Delmarva shoppers like myself.

So next April I’ll do this once again and see how prices react, and if Super Fresh can remain in the market. I didn’t know that the Giant that was closed was once a Super Fresh and twice now they’ve been the highest priced competitor in this survey. So it makes me wonder how long Super Fresh can stay in the game.

Right, but for the wrong reasons

Unless you’ve crawled under a rock only to emerge today, you should already know that last week a federal judge threw out the so-called “Fair Share Health Care Act” (aka the Wal-Mart bill.) Gunpowder Chronicle and fellow MBA blogger Maryland Conservatarian have excellent posts on the matter.

But while I agree with their takes for the most part, I did want to add my two cents in because in the early days of monoblogue and my former blog ttown’s right wing conspiracy, Wal-Mart was one of my pet issues. It was the first thing I ever spoke to Norm Conway about back when the override vote was going to happen in January.

What I told Norm was that I disagreed with the purpose and punitive nature of the act, however, I did have to begrudingly concede that to me the Maryland General Assembly was the proper venue for it. And this is what bothers me about Judge Motz’s ruling last week. There he cited that Fair Share is trumped by federal ERISA laws and also that it would be unfair for Wal-Mart to have to track its Maryland costs differently than it would in the rest of the country.

But Wal-Mart already has to suit its business to fit in 50 different states, not to mention a byzantine system of local laws. In some states they have design their stores with space to accept returned bottles, for example. Other localities prohibit Wal-Mart from having a grocery component. I doubt that you could walk into a Wal-Mart and find that it’s precisely the same as another Wal-Mart anywhere in the chain. So to me the cost tracking issue is a weak argument.

In fact, Motz notes, “In light of what is generally perceived as a national health care crisis, it would seem that to the extent ERISA allows (emphasis mine), it is strongly in the public interest to permit states to perform their traditional role of serving as laboratories for experiment in controlling the costs and increasing the quality of health care for all citizens.”

It seems to me that a true follower of the Constitution would have to say that ERISA was the problem and not the “Fair Share Health Care Act.” That’s certainly not to say that I’m a supporter of the Wal-Mart bill, but to me the proper way to eliminate it (short of legislation rescinding the bill) is to have a state court decide the matter on whether it violates Articles 16 and 17 of the Constitution of Maryland. And if they say it’s not forbidden by those Articles, we work to elect a General Assembly more amenable to the interests of businesses and other private job providers.

Akin to the Reds “winning” the 1919 World Series over the “Black Sox”, the result I wanted came out of this, but for the wrong reasons and in the wrong arena.

The market basket

Again, I’m doing something a little bit out of the ordinary, but there is a method to my madness. Part of it is for my own personal sake, but there’s the statistic freak in me that has to come out once in awhile; the guy who looks at everything in raw numbers.

But the other reason is pretty simple: all of us have to eat, and all of us like to spend as little money trying to do so as possible. If you’ve ever seen me grocery shop, I carry a notebook with my list on it and on that list is the grocery specials on things I like to consume that are perused from the weekly ads from Giant, Super Fresh, and Food Lion…they’re all on my “Favorites” list and I spend a little time each Saturday checking out the ads online to make my list for Sunday shopping.

One thing I’ve noticed in my time on Delmarva though is that Wal-Mart seems to beat the sale prices half the time. So, numbers freak that I am, a few weeks ago I made a “sample” grocery list of 20 items and Sunday I went out and actually compared the prices.

Now, in order to present these properly, I’m going to have to do a .xls file and place it on my server because there’s no good way to make tables here. So this post will be amended in the next couple days to present the actual list and prices. Yeah, I know, it’s kind of a cheap cliffhanger of sorts, but it’s also almost 11:00 and I’m not staying up half the night to do this post – there’s much more than the prices to make up the story and prove the point.

That’s because I’m planning on making this a semi-occasional continuing process. One reason is just to keep people on Delmarva aware of price trends. Gas is close to $3 a gallon – that effect will trickle down into consumer products sooner or later, as would a downward trend in energy prices.

The second reason is that two pieces of legislation were enacted by the Maryland General Assembly this year, and they could adversely affect grocery prices. One law particularly affects Wal-Mart, but the other law raising the minimum wage may affect the bottom line of all four to an extent as well, since many at the lowest rungs of the grocery business are making pretty close to minimum (think of the teenage bagger or cart collector.)

So this is my little study of microeconomics and the effect of outside factors on the price of food. How much more will be vacuumed out of your wallet with all these external factors?

Without further ado, here are the total bills using the list of the 20 items selected. Tomorrow I should have the backup file completed and link to it here. It’s a WordPerfect file, didn’t need a spreadsheet until next time.

Wal-Mart’s total bill – $41.83
Food Lion’s total – $52.27
Giant’s total – $55.80
Super Fresh’s total – $58.01 $57.01

Now, before the Wal-Mart haters get into a snit about how Wal-Mart is using its leverage to kill the mom-and-pop stores around Salisbury, let it be known that these aren’t tiny chains:

“…Food Lion LLC is a member of Brussels-based Delhaize Group (NYSE: DEG). Food Lion is one of the largest supermarket chains in the United States, operating 1,300 supermarkets, either directly or through affiliated entities, under the names of Food Lion, Bloom, Bottom Dollar, Harveys and Reid’s. These stores meet local customer needs and preferences for the freshest and best quality products in 11 Southeastern and Mid-Atlantic states.”

“Giant Food Inc. was founded in 1936 in Washington, D.C. Today, the company serves customers in the Baltimore/Washington market area and in the Delaware Valley regions of New Jersey and Delaware. The Giant Family now includes over 25,000 associates. In 1998, Giant became a member of the Royal Ahold international family of fine grocery stores.”

“Super Fresh opened its first store in Philadelphia in 1982 and has been creating an exciting, customer friendly shopping experience ever since. We have grown from just a handful of stores in the Philly area to a strong regional chain with 76 stores, serving customers throughout Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware and Maryland. Although the Super Fresh name has only been around since 1982, the company draws upon many years of grocery retail history.

The Great Atlantic and Pacific Tea Company (A & P), the parent company of Super Fresh, has been in business since 1859. The success of the company comes from the combination of the forward thinking of Super Fresh and the rich tradition of The Great Atlantic and Pacific Tea Company. “

It’s long since past the day when the corner grocery store was a mom-and-pop operation, as you can see by the players in the Salisbury area. In fact, it’s now a global business as two of the four are foreign-owned.

In the coming months I’ll repeat this experiment occasionally just to check up on how consumer prices are being affected by economic factors. And as stated, I’ll post the actual results and list soon – perhaps you can check your own grocery store and see how the prices compare. I’d love to see someone from Northwest Ohio do this, because I swear groceries are more expensive here than they were back there.

Study notes: the list was made up in early March so I couldn’t cherrypick sale prices. I shopped at the Fruitland Wal-Mart, the Waverly Giant, the Super Fresh on College Avenue, and the Food Lion at Route 50 and Tilghman Road. Other notes will be on the file showing the actual list and prices.

Extra edit: Some will probably question my use of certain products, but I tried to stay with national brands that are found in all the stores, except I used the store brand milk and eggs.

It occurred to me as I was finishing up the list that I should have specified a couple more things – for example, I’m not sure I used large eggs at each store. And Wonder bread now comes in a confusing array of white breads. But that’s not going to make a difference in the overall rank.

Also, it’s possible that the prices at Wal-Mart are also temporary sale prices, but I get no grocery ad from them that says so. It’s apparent from months of shopping there that these prices are pretty much the standard.

I’m going to have to remind myself come fall to do this again – optimally I’ll use a week that’s enough before a holiday to not affect prices greatly. Then I’ll have a comparison to the prices in the spring and can see how much inflation has hit the grocery market.

Odd and ends #4

Just a bunch of little stuff, not necessarily enough in each part to make a full post. So hopefully the total is greater than the sum of its parts.

First of all, I noticed a week or so ago that the Justice For All? blog was having some issues with Google. It appears Hadley has the blog back up and going but without everything previous to this month. That’s unfortunate because one thing I feature on my blog is what I consider the best of my comments elsewhere (“My Feedback”) and JFA has a bunch of them, which are now dead links.

But Hadley is certainly not alone in his complaint, as Michelle Malkin attests.

If you are familiar with the story of monoblogue, you’ll recall that I once had a Blogger account. But I decided to leave Blogger shortly after a post I did in July of last year, and it was for economic reasons. I really didn’t want to consciously support a company whose employees gave over 95% of their campaign contributions to liberals and their causes. (To that end, you’ll notice I have no Google ads.)

It was through some of the other local blogs that I saw the rechristened “Son of Wal-Mart” (aka House Bill 1510) was defeated in committee. Interestingly enough, the vote was 13-9 to kill the bill. Since I’m all but certain that Democrats are a majority on the committee (as they are in the House of Delegates overall) it has to mean that they were feeling heat from someplace. The $64,000 question is whether it was:

a) the negative press on it, including articles in the Wall Street Journal and mentions on Rush Limbaugh’s show

b) the fact that 2006 is an election year for each and every one of the 188 Senators and Delegates in the General Assembly, not to mention two key statewide races

c) the power of the blogosphere, including myself.

While I’d love to think the answer was c) I think the reality staring Democrats in the face made b) the answer. Even though the vast majority of Democrat seats are likely “safe” because of voting demographics, it’s not totally out of the question for enough seats to flip over to the GOP to enable a re-elected Governor Ehrlich to have his vetoes sustained. It’s bad enough for the Democrats that the gay marriage issue was thrown in their lap by a judge; thus, passing “Son of Wal-Mart” this year would truly energize another conservative base of voters.

Speaking of voting bases, it’s starting to look like the long wait for county offices to attract candidates is over. We now have four candidates for Sheriff and three for county executive. The remaining question is how many people will flock to county council seats, especially with the recent turnaround on annexation.

I think Monday’s WCRC meeting will be an interesting one because of this and other issues.

Once again, if you read this blog on a regular basis you’ll find that I’m very pro-growth. One main reason is that my paycheck depends on people wanting to invest in development, whether of a business or residential nature. And it’s not just Wicomico County, but all over the Eastern Shore and beyond.

In our business, we have a lot of regulations to deal with, mostly of a restrictive nature. Honestly, 95% of them are common sense – one example is having fire-rated tenant separation walls so a fire in one unit is less likely to spread to another. The amount of exemption from certain fire code items you gain by installing sprinklers is another sensible restriction.

But in the case of Wicomico County and the whole growth controversy, I’m a little befuddled. Part of the reason is because I’m a “come here” so I have a short point of reference. In my readings of the local blogs, though, I’ve gathered two important nuggets. One is that somewhere, probably locked away in the most secure vault on the Eastern Shore, is Wicomico County’s master plan. Well, it must be locked away, because to hear the local blogosphere, it’s being ignored!

The other item is the subject of “pipestem” annexations. I was under the impression that Salisbury was attempting to streamline and square off their boundaries. But instead they run their boundaries several miles farther out, extending pipestems like so many tentacles and latching themselves further toward Delaware and other county borders.

It seems to me that it’s much easier to annex land in Maryland than in Ohio, mainly because Ohio has a township form of government for unincorporated areas. So when a city or village expands, there’s automatically a government entity that gets smaller and the township trustees generally fight annexations tooth and nail because it shrinks their tax base. Several times in my home area annexation battles have ended up in court. In one case, the battle was over city sewer and water being extended to unincorporated areas in exchange for not fighting annexation – but the township residents wanted no part of the higher city tax rates and sued the city.

Here in Maryland, it’s almost like Wicomico County has a “whatever…” attitude toward annexation, less area to take care of. Since it seems all the state money to run government comes from the same pot, there’s not a net loss to the county by losing territory, but it’s fewer miles of road to fix or less snow to plow.

Growth is an issue I can see both sides of. To me, it’s not growth that’s the problem, since it’s going to happen if an area is reasonably attractive. We happen to be in an area that has a nice climate and a rural feel that many seek. And it’s my opinion that even doubling the population wouldn’t change that.

County executive candidate Ron Alessi alluded to my concern when he spoke of getting good jobs here. But how can that get done? In a perfect world, each house that’s constructed also gets some place for the homeowner to work, as well as the public facilities necessary to maintain the house’s safety, utilities, accessibility to the job through improved roads, etc., etc. But it sounds like we have shortages of most of the other facets that go into a good community.

Delmarva has some assets to a company looking for a good location to place a factory or other facility. It has a nice location for “quality of life” issues and at least Delaware is somewhat business-friendly. The minuses are transportation needs, since it’s difficult to access a lot of places from here with Chesapeake Bay. But if there’s a company who doesn’t have a lot of time-sensitive issues, we’re as good a place as any to locate, maybe better than most.

Rather than kowtow to every residential developer in the region, what are we doing to get more jobs to the area? I’m not saying we need a Kia plant but someone ought to sell the region better to job providers. (Having a more business-friendly General Assembly would help too.) White-collar corporations could be lured to our area’s proximity to DC and the Northeast – close enough for easy access, far enough away so you don’t smell it.

I’m going to end this overall rant with one close to my heart. I sent and received e-mail from Brian Cleary, who’s the Operations Manager for Clear Channel of Delmarva (they run, among others, 96 Rock.) The subject was this year’s “Thirsty Thursday” band lineup at the Shorebirds games. It pissed me off royally when I read:

Sadly, the Thirsty Thursdays with the Shorebirds this year will not feature live bands … last year, we were able to secure the bands for the Shorebirds. However, for a number of reasons, we backed off playing the local music (ratings the biggest factor – the lack of cooperation and enthusiasm from the local acts one of the others), so those bands aren’t really working with us any more…(i)nstead for this year’s Thirsty Thursdays, we will have Whiskey & Cowboy broadcasting their show at the stadium.

Come on, what could’ve been better than beer, ball, and bands? Leave it to somebody to mess up a good thing.

It’s a very sad state of affairs when this is all the better we can do. One thing I got to love quickly about the area when I moved here was the support the local radio stations gave to regional bands. Instead of playing Nickelback for the 300th time, 96 Rock would play a local band’s song in a semi-regular rotation, plus every week they did “Local Lixx” which was an hour of local music. Now, I know some of the local bands dropped the ball (there’s a larger audience on the Internet, particularly myspace.com) but free airplay is free airplay, people. Do you think I wouldn’t like a plug for this blog on Bill Reddish’s show?

It really sucks because last year’s “Thirsty Thursdays” introduced me to some great groups like Control Freaks, Not Alone, Chowderfoot, and 7 Days Torn, among a host of others. There’s just so many good groups out there in our area that deserve support and another outlet for supporting them has vanished. Instead, we’ll be “entertained” by a wannabe morning crew that happens to be on in the afternoons.

Hopefully I’ll still get to see some good bands at “Beast of the East” this year, but since I think 96 Rock brought those bands in last year, it remains to be seen. No one’s announced yet at the site. The band list for “Pork in the Park” is up already though, they have an interesting assortment of groups.

It’s less than three weeks to the real beginning of spring. When the Shorebirds play and we get the twin weekend events of Pork in the Park and Beast of the East, it’s time to get ready for another fun Delmarva summer!

Update on HB1510

Since there was an article today in the Daily Times and I found out in looking the bill status up that a hearing on it was held today, it appears that the so-called “son of Wal-Mart” may be gaining traction. (Also a h/t to Duvafiles is in order.)

We can still stop this attempt to drive business out of Maryland. Get informed and get involved.

The first reading bill text and now the fiscal notes are available online.

Like this is a surprise?

I will give the large hat tip to Rush today for introducing me to this article by Brendan Miniter. My ears perk up whenever he mentions the Free State and we got a lot of airtime today.

In case the link ceases to work (I know the Wall Street Journal site is a subscription site, whereas the OpinionJournal is the “free side”) the money passage is this:

let’s turn to (Delegate James) Hubbard. He began our conversation by pointing out that the Wal-Mart bill–which forces companies with more than 10,000 employees to spend at least 8% of their payroll on health care or pay the state the difference–was always intended to be just the first step (emphasis mine). Four years ago, he made his intentions clear by introducing legislation to increase cigarette taxes and to use the tax code to compel employers to provide health insurance. Under his legislation the revenue from these taxes would be dumped into a new state fund that would then be used to expand Medicaid eligibility to families with incomes up to 300% of the poverty line (up from 200% now). But even in a legislature with large Democratic majorities, his bill stalled.

So Mr. Hubbard and others settled on a new approach–pushing through smaller, bite-sized pieces. The first piece was the Wal-Mart bill. It passed last year and was enacted last month, when the Legislature overrode Gov. Robert Ehrlich’s veto. Two weeks ago Mr. Hubbard was at it again, this time introducing a new bill to mandate that companies with at least 1,000 employees spend 4.5% of their payroll on health care or pay the state the difference. Once this piece is in place, Mr. Hubbard told me, the next step will be to create a similar mandate–perhaps 2% or 3%–for companies with fewer than 1,000 employees. Each year, Mr. Hubbard hopes to expand the mandate to include ever smaller companies with the ultimate goal of “health coverage for all Marylanders.”

Mr. Hubbard noted how effective splitting the difference can be in moving legislation toward a larger goal. “If you give up 80% of what you want to get 20%,” he said, “after five years you will have nothing left to give up.”

This is the relevant portion of the text of HB 1510, which is an omnibus bill regarding health care in general (it’s innocently titled Public-Private Partnership for Health Coverage for All Marylanders. Some partnership, a gun to the head isn’t a real alliance.) The bill as a whole is a 50 page .pdf file.

I believe the way this works is that additions to existing statute are in ALL CAPS. Perhaps a lawyer-type can help me on that.

Article – Labor and Employment

8 8.5-101.

9 (a) In this title the following words have the meanings indicated.
10 (b) “Employee” means all individuals employed full time or part time directly
11 by an employer.
12 (c) (1) Except as provided in paragraph (2) of this subsection, “employer”
13 has the meaning stated in § 10-905 of the Tax – General Article.
14 (2) “Employer” does not include the federal government, the State,
15 another state, or a political subdivision of the State or another state.
16 (d) (1) “Health insurance costs” means the amount paid by an employer to
17 provide health care or health insurance to employees in the State to the extent the
18 costs may be deductible by an employer under federal tax law.
19 (2) “Health insurance costs” includes payments for medical care,
20 prescription drugs, vision care, medical savings accounts, and any other costs to
21 provide health benefits as defined in § 213(d) of the Internal Revenue Code.
22 (e) “Secretary” means the Secretary of Labor, Licensing, and Regulation.
23 (f) “Wages” has the meaning stated in § 10-905 of the Tax – General Article.
24 8.5-102.
25 This title applies to an employer with [10,000] ONE or more employees in the
26 State.
27 8.5-103.
28 (a) (1) On January 1, [2007] 2008, and annually thereafter, an employer
29 shall submit on a form and in a manner approved by the Secretary:
30 (i) the number of employees of the employer in the State as of 1
31 day in the year immediately preceding the previous calendar year as determined by
32 the employer on an annual basis;

44 UNOFFICIAL COPY OF HOUSE BILL 1510

1 (ii) the amount spent by the employer in the year immediately
2 preceding the previous calendar year on health insurance costs in the State; and
3 (iii) the percentage of payroll that was spent by the employer in the
4 year immediately preceding the previous calendar year on health insurance costs in
5 the State.
6 (2) The Secretary shall adopt regulations that specify the information
7 that an employer shall submit under paragraph (1) of this subsection.
8 (3) The information required shall:
9 (i) be designated in a report signed by the principal executive
10 officer or an individual performing a similar function; and
11 (ii) include an affidavit under penalty of perjury that the
12 information required under paragraph (1) of this subsection:
13 1. was reviewed by the signing officer; and
14 2. is true to the best of the signing officer’s knowledge,
15 information, and belief.
16 (b) When calculating the percentage of payroll under subsection (a)(1)(iii) of
17 this section, an employer may exempt:
18 (1) wages paid to any employee in excess of the median household
19 income in the State as published by the United States Census Bureau; and
20 (2) wages paid to an employee who is enrolled in or eligible for Medicare.
21 8.5-104.
22 (a) An employer WITH 10,000 OR MORE EMPLOYEES that is organized as a
23 nonprofit organization that does not spend up to 6% of the total wages paid to
24 employees in the State on health insurance costs shall pay to the Secretary an
25 amount equal to the difference between what the employer spends for health
26 insurance costs and an amount equal to 6% of the total wages paid to employees in
27 the State.
28 (b) An employer WITH 10,000 OR MORE EMPLOYEES that is not organized as a
29 nonprofit organization and does not spend up to 8% of the total wages paid to
30 employees in the State on health insurance costs shall pay to the Secretary an
31 amount equal to the difference between what the employer spends for health
32 insurance costs and an amount equal to 8% of the total wages paid to employees in
33 the State.
34 (C) AN EMPLOYER WITH FEWER THAN 10,000 EMPLOYEES THAT IS ORGANIZED
35 AS A NONPROFIT ORGANIZATION THAT DOES NOT SPEND UP TO 3% OF THE TOTAL
36 WAGES PAID TO EMPLOYEES IN THE STATE ON HEALTH INSURANCE COSTS SHALL

45 UNOFFICIAL COPY OF HOUSE BILL 1510

1 PAY TO THE SECRETARY AN AMOUNT EQUAL TO THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN WHAT
2 THE EMPLOYER SPENDS FOR HEALTH INSURANCE COSTS AND AN AMOUNT EQUAL
3 TO 3% OF THE TOTAL WAGES PAID TO EMPLOYEES IN THE STATE.
4 (D) AN EMPLOYER WITH FEWER THAN 10,000 EMPLOYEES THAT IS NOT
5 ORGANIZED AS A NONPROFIT ORGANIZATION AND DOES NOT SPEND UP TO 4.5% OF
6 THE TOTAL WAGES PAID TO EMPLOYEES IN THE STATE ON HEALTH INSURANCE
7 COSTS SHALL PAY TO THE SECRETARY AN AMOUNT EQUAL TO THE DIFFERENCE
8 BETWEEN WHAT THE EMPLOYER SPENDS FOR HEALTH INSURANCE COSTS AND AN
9 AMOUNT EQUAL TO 4.5% OF THE TOTAL WAGES PAID TO EMPLOYEES IN THE STATE.
10 [(c)] (E) An employer may not deduct any payment made under subsection
11 [(a) or (b)] (A), (B), (C), OR (D) of this section from the wages of an employee.
12 [(d)] (F) An employer shall make the payment required under this section to
13 the Secretary on a periodic basis as determined by the Secretary.
14 8.5-105.
15 (a) Failure to report in accordance with § 8.5-103 of this title shall result in
16 the imposition by the Secretary of a civil penalty of $250 for each day that the report
17 is not timely filed.
18 (b) Failure to make the payment required under § 8.5-104 of this title shall
19 result in the imposition by the Secretary of a civil penalty of $250,000.

What a surprise, take a little in 2005, go for more in 2006. The next part I didn’t print goes into importing Canadian prescription drugs and, if the federal government doesn’t grant the state a waiver, a mandate that the state Attorney General file suit against the federal government.

Again, the Delegate who sponsored HB 1510 is James W. Hubbard, of District 23A. I realize it’s a longshot to find a Republican in PG County to try and unseat him, but this nutjob has got to go. A more realistic thing to do would be to encourage our Delegates to stop HB 1510 dead in its tracks. According to the General Assembly website, this bill was rereferred to the Health and Government Operations subcommittee yesterday. Let’s make sure it doesn’t see the light of day again.

Union toadies take the day

Bad news from Annapolis, as the chasing of business out of Maryland begins. The “Fair Share” veto properly applied by Governor Ehrlich was overriden.

According to the Baltimore Sun, there were 3 Senate Democrats from Anne Arundel County who properly voted to uphold the veto, but it did not say how the House of Delegates split out. Currently the delegates are split 98-43 in favor of the Democrats (isn’t that sickening?) but the final override vote was 88-50. So at least 10 Democrats didn’t get the memo from their union. Of course, knowing they had it in the bag once they got to 85 votes it’s possible the Democrat leadership may have allowed a few in swing districts to vote to uphold the veto. So it’s possible my two delegates may have followed my advice, but overall the story’s still bad for business.

More bad news for small business may follow tomorrow, as the House of Delegates voted 91-48 to override Governor Ehrlich’s veto of a minimum-wage increase. It still has to be taken up by the Senate.

Let me guess…in 30 days when the “Fair Share Health Care Act” takes effect, Wal-Mart’s going to announce that they’ve decided to place their distribution center in Delaware instead. Just hope it’s in southern Sussex County so some people in Salisbury may work there.

As for me, might be time to skip Giant (who helped push the Fair Share bill in the first place) for a couple weeks on my shopping rounds.

Late update, 2 p.m. Friday:

I found on the Sun’s website how the vote went.

On the side to override in the Senate were 30 of the 33 Democrats, which accounted for all 30 votes. Three Democrats joined the 14 Republicans in seeking to sustain the veto.

In the House of Delegates, 87 of the 98 Democrats voted for the override along with one of the 43 Republicans. That one was Jean Cryor of Montgomery County, a very heavily Democrat area. All but one of the other 42 Republicans voted to uphold the veto along with 9 Democrats. Two other Democrats did not vote.

As expected, Delegates Bozman and Conway sucked up to the unions and turned their back on Somerset County, voting to override.

Rush just got finished commenting on this – he noted that one object of this legislation is to raise Wal-Mart’s price point and ruin their business plan.

Hearing from the other side

I have a little help in the “Fair Share” battle.

In my recent post, “The battle is joined” I noted that one of the things on my “to do” list was to call both of my state delegates, Bennett Bozman and Norman Conway. Last Friday, I did so. While I still haven’t heard from Delegate Bozman or his office, I heard quickly from Delegate Conway. He was very polite and listened to the points and arguments I made to help convince him to vote in the right manner.

There were some points that Delegate Conway brought up that I found interesting. Chief among them is that he’s the head of the Appropriations Committee, so I suppose if anyone knows about the state’s budget he would be the guy to know. He told me that the state is facing what he termed a $160 million structural deficit. I looked this up on Maryland’s website and the Spending Affordability Committee report from 2005 does show structural deficits in “out” years (FY 2007 on.) (Note: this is a 105 page .pdf file.) That report shows FY 2007 as a $300 million deficit.

However, since the report came out there has been news of a $600 million surplus from this year’s budget. So I’m a little bit confused about whether these numbers the SAC came up with aren’t too pessimistic. Possibly the $160 million Conway spoke of includes an adjustment for this, but it’s hard to say.

Delegate Conway also cited Wal-Mart’s profitability from last year, noting that floor testimony stated the company made $10 billion and cost the state of Maryland $250 million in Medicare expenses because of gaps in Wal-Mart’s health insurance.

Let’s look at this in two different ways. Assume that both numbers Conway cited are correct. Maryland is almost a perfect “average” state in population, our roughly 5.5 million people is right around 1/50 of the nation’s total. So if every state decided to tax Wal-Mart in a similar way that Fair Share would, suddenly the $10 billion profit is a $2.5 billion loss. Then Wal-Mart would have to lay off workers and close stores, thus putting these people right back on the public dole.

Plus, I saw a report the other day that is cited on the “My feedback” page as I responded to a post on Duvafiles. That report showed that the typical low-wage employee is a $898 drain on the state’s Medicare system. That means it’s not just Wal-Mart – it’s K-Mart, Target, McDonald’s, Burger King, Best Buy – all those employers put a little drain on the system.

I will say one thing about Del. Conway – he did sound surprised about the union-sponsored radio commercials citing his stand on the issue, claiming he didn’t know about them until he heard one himself. And I’ll believe him. I did tell him that he is pursuing a solution in the correct arena, since Medicare truly should be a state issue rather than a federal one.

He does have a good, principled stand – I just happen to think it’s the wrong stand.

But the pro-Wal-Mart side has finally gotten some of their message out. I found this link right on the Sun’s website. Also, the Maryland Chamber of Commerce weighed in with an opinion that “Fair Share” violates portions of the federal ERISA Act.

So it’s going to be an interesting week to come.

Now, since I’m on the subject of health care, I have a bone to pick with the health care industry.

Why is it that I get a bill for $131 from my doctor, but when the health insurer pays the doctor, they give the doctor’s office $77? I understand that the doctor’s office has a good deal of overhead, but is it possible that having to deal with all the red tape creates the majority of it?

My doctor’s office has at least one person who handles solely billings and another person who handles referrals. They have nothing to do with patient care, but the doctor has to pay them and lease that little extra bit of space for them. There’s really something wrong with the health care industry.

And I can tell you right now, just based on experience and observation, that the WORST thing we can do is make it solely a government-run program like “HillaryCare” promised to be. I think something on the order of Medical Savings Accounts would be a good idea. I wouldn’t have to worry about having a chiropractor who is out-of-network. MSA’s also discourage needless trips to the emergency room, at least as I see it.

The more things in the health-care sphere that are directly controlled by the patient, the better the system works. And the less red tape there is (along with a serious tort reform measure to help curb the cost of liability insurance), the easier it is for a doctor to actually practice medicine rather than play defense.

The battle is joined

Looks like it’s time for the fight to begin. January 11th is just around the corner, and that’s the start date to our 90 days of lunacy known as the General Assembly session. At or near the top of the list is going to be the vote on overriding Governor Ehrlich’s veto of the so-called “Fair Share” bill.

I was reminded of this yesterday listening to the radio. I was working out and minding my own business when I heard a commercial. (Hopefully the link works, it’s the actual .mp3 file.) And it just so happens that Delegates Bozman and Conway are MY delegates.

So I laughed to myself and said, “well well well…looks like it’s time to take the fight to them.” Step number one is right here, I dashed off a letter to the Daily Times. As always, we’ll see if they have the balls to print it.

Yesterday I was listening to the radio and a commercial came on asking me to thank Delegates Bozman and Conway for their support for “fairness” – that concept being determined by their support of a particular piece of legislation.

After listening to that, I said to myself, “ok, the battle is joined now. It’s going to be the special interests and the money that they all but coerce out of their workers to put ads on the radio, against me and my words that I type on my computer and hope to have placed in the paper.” Luckily, I know that common sense and right are on my side.

Here’s why. When they speak of “fairness,” they forget to tell you that this bill is written against one particular multibillion dollar entity. Just one. It would be as if the rest of Maryland decided to levy a tax against the citizens of Salisbury for a real or perceived advantage they have over the remainder of the state.

In fact, their commercial never cites the entity by name, nor does it reveal the true source of the funds behind buying its time on the radio, simply billing itself as “Maryland for Health Care.”

Well, I live in Maryland and I’m for health care too (is there anyone who’s not?) But I’m not for using the power of the legislature for gaining an unfair advantage at the expense of a successful company. As a resident of their district, not some far-off national concern coming into Delmarva with slickly packaged radio ads, I strongly encourage Delegates Bozman and Conway to reconsider their previous stance and uphold Governor Ehrlich’s veto of “Fair Share.”

And I wonder what I’ll be doing this Friday afternoon when I get off work. Think I have a phone call or two to make. That’s step two.

Oh, as if it wouldn’t be patently obvious, “Maryland for Health Care” is a front organization for the Service Employees International Union. I suppose the SEIU decided that the United Food and Commercial Workers had put enough money into lobbyists and political contributions to the Democrats in Annapolis so it was their turn.

It’ll be a story to follow as the time gets closer. We’ll see if Maryland really wants to punish achievers, wipe out Somerset County’s bid for 800-1000 jobs, and show that special interests run the state. Considering which party has a stranglehold on the General Assembly, it’s pretty obvious what the answer will be. Even so, I’m not going to just sit idly by without making my feelings known. It’s time to fight.