Just as he believes the state should not be involved in setting wages for construction workers on state-funded projects, Senate Government Organization Chairman Craig Blair, R-Berkeley, wants to repeal a 75-year-old state law that prevents wholesalers and retailers from selling goods and services at below cost.
"You can charge whatever you want, and the government won't have anything to do with it," Blair said of legislation to repeal the state's Unfair Trade Practices Act (SB 259).
Enacted in 1939, the law states that it is intended to "safeguard the public against the creation and perpetration of monopolies and to foster and encourage competition."
Intended to prevent large companies from driving competitors out of business by temporarily offering below-cost prices, the law requires at least a 4 percent markup over cost by wholesalers, and at least a 7 percent markup by retailers.
While it may have served a purpose in the Great Depression, Blair said the law - like the prevailing wage statute he also opposes - is an unnecessary intrusion of government into the free-market economy.
"When government gets involved in setting prices - price fixing - then you end up with a perverted economic system that has undue components that affect the consumer," Blair said.
As a practical example, he said the law inflates the cost of gasoline by more than 20 cents a gallon, which he believes is the reason gasoline retailers oppose the bill.
"Some are trying to make that it's a partisan bill, and it's anything but," Blair said.
Blair's Government Organization Committee was scheduled to take up the bill Tuesday, but took it off the agenda following objections from the West Virginia Oil Marketers and Grocers Association (OMEGA), which represents gasoline retailers, convenience stores and independent grocers.
Ryan Thorn, government affairs coordinator for OMEGA, said the Unfair Trade Act is an important backstop to protect small businesses against large corporations.
"It's a protection for West Virginia's small, locally owned businesses," he said.
Repeal of the law, he said, "Would result in less competition and less choices for consumers, and, ultimately, higher prices."
Thorn said he suspects Blair and co-sponsor Sen. Herb Snyder, D-Jefferson, are playing to constituents who see lower gas prices in neighboring Virginia and Maryland.
"I'm sure they hear it from their constituents every day, why are our gas prices higher?" Thorn said, adding that OMEGA believes higher gas taxes in West Virginia, not the lack of competitive pricing, is the reason.
"There's no evidence at all that repealing Unfair Trade would lower gas prices," he said.
"I am not in the pocket of the business community," Blair responded. "I'm going to do what's right for the people of West Virginia."
Reach Phil Kabler at philk@wvgazettemail.com, 304-348-1220, or follow @PhilKabler on Twitter.