8/12/2019 The New York Time

1/2

The Shopping List as Policy Tool

ByIAN URBINAJAN. 25, 2014

WASHINGTON THE federal government spends around $500 billion annually on goods andservices. So when Uncle Sam throws his weight around, markets move.

Historically, presidents have used this leverage to achieve policy goals that were politically difficult

to accomplish through legislation. In 1941, for example, President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued an

executive order prohibiting racial discrimination by defense contractors after it became clear that

federal legislation would be impossible because of the stranglehold that Southern Democrats had

on Congress.

Since then, the government has used its purchasing power to promote an array of other social

goals, including ending forced child labor, promoting recycled paper, incentivizing the hiring of

disabled people and opposing apartheid.

President Obama has made one major foray into this realm. In September 2012, he issued an

executive order strengthening rules preventing federal agencies from using factories that relied on

forced labor or trafficked workers. As the largest single purchaser of goods and services in the

world, he wrote, the United States government bears a responsibility to ensure that taxpayer

dollars do not contribute to trafficking in persons.

Launch media viewer

Demonstrators at a rally supporting an increase in Marylands minimum wage in Annapolison Jan.

14. Jose Luis Magana/Associated Press

More recently, the White House has been mum on whether it will use this leverage again. But

pressure is mounting. Gay-rights advocates have called on the Obama administration to issue an

executive order banning discrimination by federal contractors. Environmentalists have said the

government could go a long way toward controlling climate change simply by tightening fuel-

efficiency requirements on the governments roughly 600,000-vehicle fleet. This alone would force

changes throughout the entire auto market, they say.

Yet most of the discussion in recent months has focused on ways the government can use its

buying power to improve wages and working conditions, both domestically and abroad. In

response to revelations that many federal agencies rely on garment factories overseas that break

local labor laws, several lawmakers said this month that they planned to introduce legislation

requiring agencies to reveal which foreign suppliers they used and tosubmit to third-party

audits. And Representative Carolyn Maloney, Democrat of New York, and labor advocates wrote

the president this month asking him to issue an executive order on the matter.

http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/u/ian_urbina/index.htmlhttp://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/u/ian_urbina/index.htmlhttp://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/u/ian_urbina/index.htmlhttp://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/26/sunday-review/the-shopping-list-as-policy-tool.html?hp&rref=opinionhttp://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/26/sunday-review/the-shopping-list-as-policy-tool.html?hp&rref=opinionhttp://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/26/sunday-review/the-shopping-list-as-policy-tool.html?hp&rref=opinionhttp://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/26/sunday-review/the-shopping-list-as-policy-tool.html?hp&rref=opinionhttp://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/26/sunday-review/the-shopping-list-as-policy-tool.html?hp&rref=opinionhttp://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/u/ian_urbina/index.html

8/12/2019 The New York Time

2/2