Congress introduced the “Employee Free Choice Act” last week, which would end the secret ballot system currently in place for workers who vote on whether to start a union.

The bill could have disastrous effects on companies and would throw another wrench in U.S. labor relations, says University of Chicago law Professor and Cato Adjunct Scholar Richard A. Epstein in Tuesday’s Cato Daily Podcast:

It would be a major transformation of the American labor force, all for the worse as far as I’m concerned. Because it would mean that the monopoly model of the labor statutes that were intro under the Wagner Act would now become gov policy to the extent that a card check could allow a union essentially to contain partial ownership rights over the management and prerogatives of the firm.

A worse piece of legislation I cannot imagine, with respect to this field.

Epstein offers a more detailed look at the card-check legislation in the Spring issue of Cato’s magazine Regulation, which will be released March 26.