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2000 years ago, a newscaster that we know of as Jesus Christ warned us about false Christianity. The warning was not against the devil but against false Christianity…about people who come in His name and deceive many.
I’m from the government and I’m here to help.
We all know those words of Ronald Reagan who said these are the seven most dangerous words or horrible words a business owner or anybody can hear.
Hi, this is Bob Barney with the Plain Truth Minute at 7:11, and I want to go over a personal story about how government regulations alter all of our lives. I will explain how these regulations cost us more in so many ways, financially of course, and also how they cause us to have to do way more than we really should have to do. All of this resulting in the reason why so many companies move to China or overseas.
Believe it or not, most companies that move to China, for example, do not do so for cheap labor. I know that’s what unions want you to believe, and what politicians want you to believe, but that is not the real reason that they move to China; especially those who are in my same business. I think I’ve told you before that my wife and I and my family own an automotive paint manufacturing company. We manufacture paint that goes on cars and trucks and boats and airplanes, and most of the ingredients are ingredients that are on the banned list or on the watch list of the EPA and OSHA. They want to get rid of them, and there are no good substitutes for those products.
So, what happens is that the companies who used to make all of these raw materials that we buy in the United States, that used to make them in Texas and mainly in the Midwest, have all moved to China. Almost every product that I buy, including the cans, come from China, and there’s a reason for it.
It has nothing to do with labor.
It has to do with the regulations that companies are under when it comes to the EPA, OSHA, fire marshals, you name it, and the disguise of safety when safety has nothing to do with anything! I’ll give you an example. About five years ago, the EPA raided, and I’m going to use the word raided, my facility as well as the friend of mine across the street with an industrial paint company that he manufactures products for floor coatings, for industrial applications, OEM, and his products do not sell for the kind of prices my products sell for, so they have to learn how to cut cost. Now, when you’re making primer, just like when you’re making women’s makeup, for example, you have to have some kind of a build.
You start with a resin, and you have solvents, or maybe water if that’s your solvent, and then you have different ingredients like corrosion inhibitors or stuff like that, and then on top of that, you have to have some kind of a filler because of the idea of a primer is to be thicker than the actual paint so you can apply it. You can sand it in many cases to make it nice and smooth and get rid of all the imperfections in the substrate, and so, for example, the better fillers that we use in automotive are talc and clay. Now, there’s no prohibition of clay that I know of, but talc, some claim is a cancer causer. I’m not in agreement with that, but let’s say that it is a cancer-causing substance, and so talc is on the watch list. Believe it or not, talc is not on the watch list when it comes to making paint. We can have all the talc we want and there is nothing we have to worry about.
Now, a cheaper form of talc for primer is something called calcium carbonate and industrial paint companies like my friends use a lot of calcium carbonate instead of talc because they can buy it for half the price that you can buy talc for. So when the EPA came, they discovered that he was carrying over 10,000 pounds of calcium carbonate, and they were horrified and informed him there was going to be like a $19,000 fine, and by the way, that’s what all of these inspections are about…the fines. So, they were going to fine him for having such a large quantity of such a dangerous substance as10,000 pounds was the limit he could carry, and so they were going to level a $19,000 fine. Who’s going to pay that fine? But it gets worse. You see, he had to hire a lawyer. Yes, you take it to court because you know there is no such regulation on the books, but they try to enforce regulations as they make them up, and that’s what happens, and so you end up spending $40,000, $50,000, $60,000 in legal defenses to prove that you were right.
They know that for most people, they are not going to do that, so they just pay the fine. The problem however when you pay the fine, however, is that you admit guilt, and then you’re always like a felon to the EPA. Many people like my friend, decided to take it to court. Now, here is the nonsensical thing about the law they made up, and this is where this story is going to end. By the way, tomorrow, I’m going to have an update on another story, a personal story…but do you know what calcium carbonate is? Well, the judge was notified what calcium carbonate is. Calcium carbonate, if you take out a package of Tums, and you read the ingredients of white Tums, not the flavored Tums that might have some fruit in it somewhere, if you read the ingredient of Tums, guess what you’re going to find out about the active ingredient in Tums…? The very ingredient that takes away indigestion or gas in your belly?
It’s calcium carbonate.
Yes, the product that the EPA said is so dangerous…the one that they say they have to fine you $19,000 for having too much of it because it’s so dangerous, is okay to put it in Tums. Well, that is the EPA. That’s the very regulations that Donald Trump is talking about that need to go away. I would say probably 75% to 85% of all the regulations on the books and enforced today, and many are not even on the books and are still enforced today, are based on junk science or no science at all, and so we are paying the cost for needless regulations. That’s why I say we no longer need an EPA. We no longer need an OSHA.
We no longer need, in my opinion even the IRS because we could replace that with a fair tax, or a national sales tax and you don’t have to worry about compliance. What we need is smart thinking and to do away with government bureaucrats that are just trying to put little guys like me and my wife out of business. They are just causing you and me a higher inflated prices and forcing the big guys to move overseas, and that is the plain truth moment for the day.
Regulations are the problem more than the employment and pay of a people and why the big companies and why most companies move overseas. That’s the plain truth, and this is Bob Barney with The Plain Truth Today saying thank you for listening. We appreciate you always and thank you for listening. I invite that if you have any comments, please let us know. Goodbye for now.