Why the anti-union animosity?

@Setanta,

Setanta wrote:

It is nonsense that public unions can just make demand after demand until they bankrupt the state. Walker is crying insolvency, but still finds about $150,o00,000 for economic stimulus.

I agree that the public unions can't bankrupt the state...that's my point as well. By electing Walker, the people of Wisconsin entrusted him to do what he feels best for the state. In this case, he feels that cutting back on union collective bargaining rights is the best thing for the state. He's well within his rights to make that decision.

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@Cycloptichorn,

Quote:

We aren't talking about the taxpayer here, we're talking about the employees' right to stand up to management decisions that harm them.

And who makes those management decisions of which you speak? Who establishes how much these union members get paid? And where does the money come from that eventually ends up in the bank accounts of those union members?

Quote:

Are you implying that others are somehow lazy, and you've worked hard to get that money - therefore you deserve to keep it?

Well, I wouldn't say lazy, but certainly the teamster that unloads trucks made different life decisions than I did and consequently we earn different wages. Are you suggesting that I deserve less to keep my wages then he?

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@slkshock7,

slkshock7 wrote:

Quote:
We aren't talking about the taxpayer here, we're talking about the employees' right to stand up to management decisions that harm them.

And who makes those management decisions of which you speak?

The management of their section of the gov't does, that they work for.

Quote:

Who establishes how much these union members get paid?

The same.

Quote:

And where does the money come from that eventually ends up in the bank accounts of those union members?

From the customers of the businesses they serve: taxpayers. However, taxpayers are not the same as management. They are a completely different entity and cannot be said to be equivalent in any way.

And I don't understand what argument you could forward that would say that these employees have no right to either negotiate with management or petition politically to improve their situation.

Quote:

Quote:
Are you implying that others are somehow lazy, and you've worked hard to get that money - therefore you deserve to keep it?
Well, I wouldn't say lazy, but certainly the teamster that unloads trucks made different life decisions than I did and consequently we earn different wages. Are you suggesting that I deserve less to keep my wages then he?

[/quote]

Pretty much, yeah. You deserve to keep your wages less than those who are farther down on the economic ladder. That's the fundamental basis of Progressive taxation, an idea long embraced by our country; a bedrock component of our way of life.

The question isn't one of inequality in wages - I'm not pissed that you make more than the guy who unloads the truck, at all. The real question is why you feel you have any cause or right to complain at all, as I pointed out earlier: you're paying the lowest levels that pretty much any taxpayer alive has ever paid. You should be taxed at a higher rate than you currently are. But then again, I think everyone should be; that would be actual 'shared sacrifice.'

Cycloptichorn

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I have to go along with Cyclo on that last point, Americans are just about the least taxed people in the industrialized world. And we get more bang for our tax buck than other countries do, too. Not only is our tax burden light in comparison to the rest of the industrialized world, bu our public sector workers earn comparatively less than public sector workers in other industrialized nations. We've got a sweet deal here, and i find it hard to sympathize with people who complain about it. Sure, all of us would like to see our tax dollars spent more efficiently. One way we could do that is to make sure there isn't any corporate wellfare (such as "economic stimulus" packages) until all the valuable programs are paid for, including decent wage and benefit packages for public sector workers.

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@Setanta,

We give oil companies kickbacks of billions that they don't need, and we also give money to farmers in the billions of dollars - for not growing stuff. How stupid is that?

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Those aren't the only corporate welfare programs. For example, we subsidize American shipping companies, which can no longer effectively compete against "flag of convenience" shippers--the rationale? Jobs. The reality? Campaign contributions to Congressmen and -women from the districts concerned. Translation? Pork.

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@Setanta,

Would you then advocate that Wisconsin, New Jersey, New York, Michigan, Ohio,, Indiana, California and other stated facing growing deficits, and where public sector wages and benefit costs are generally higher than those in comparable private sector functions, and with high private sector unemployment, raise their taxes to fund the fast rising costs of their government operations? Do you believe such an action might have any attendant negative effects on the economies of these states?

Do you believe that the alternative of laying off state employees is a better alternative to meet imminent budget issues?

While it is easy to assert that we pay less for public services and bear lower taxes than other "industrialized nations" it is also true that most of those nations are already facing even more serious public debt and budget issues than we. They may not be a useful point of reference..

Do you believe the voters in most states here are ready or inclined to raise their taxes? I don't think so.

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@georgeob1,

I don't know that i believe that labor costs are higher for those state governments than they are in the private sector for the same jobs. That certainly wasn't the case when i was a member of AFSCME. Answering your questions would be a case of surrendering to the "have you stopped beating your wife" conundrum. If i answer yes or no, i will have accepted your premises without evidence that what you say is accurate.

That voters don't want to see their taxes raised should not surprise anyone. But the crux of the issue is that people like Walker are playing fast and loose with the truth. As i pointed out earlier in this thread, with a link to Milwaukee talk radio, Walker wants to loot $28,000,000 from a public employees medical care trust fund funded by employee contributions. At the same time, as Cyclo pointed out, he also wants to hand out $150,000,000 in "economic stimulus." That's a fancy term for what we all familiarly call pork, and its corporate pork. A better series of questions might be are tax payers enamoured of the idea of funding those particular pork barrels at the expense of public sector workers who may or may not earn more than they do. Public sector employees are the villians of this piece because of successful conservative propaganda more than for any other reason.

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@Setanta,

Quote:

Public sector employees are the villians of this piece because of successful conservative propaganda more than for any other reason.

+5, hear hear.

Cycloptichorn

1 Reply

@georgeob1,

I believe we are approaching the current fiscal problems in the wrong way; it should not be either or. It should be based on several factors; a) what industry now pay on wages and benefits, b) the government fiscal crisis, c) implement changes needed to equalize what the private sector has vs the government sector. This can be done by grandfathering in promised benefits, but change the calculus for current and future government workers.

Pension fund managers have used unrealistic appreciation of their pension funds; there should be some government regulations concerning overly optimistic returns, because what has happened in the past are a) they increased benefits when they "believed" their funds were sufficiently funded, and b) gave bonus to retirees for the same reason.

With the current liabilities, most government pension funds are underfunded, and any liability that remains must be covered by taxpayers. This is not fair by any means.

Changes are necessary ASAP to alleviate future problems. The government can't wait as they have towards social security and Medicare that will run out of funds in about 25 years. The government must establish rules to enforce addressing these shortfalls on a timely basis.

They will not act if left to their own devices; history tells us this.

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@Cycloptichorn,

I don't think public sector employees are purported as the villains of this piece at all. Their unions are.

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@cicerone imposter,

Yaknow, a huge part of the current crisis in pension funds comes from the fact that many of these funds were invested in places that they 100% should not have been, and in 2008, the market crash badly hurt many of these funds.

Cycloptichorn

1 Reply

@JPB,

JPB wrote:

I don't think public sector employees are purported as the villains of this piece at all. Their unions are.

There's no difference between the two. The unions exist to forward the interests of those same employees and by all accounts they do exactly that.

It's pretty clear that the public ain't looking out for their interest. You can see why they want the unions; when times turn tough, they get scapegoated by the right-wing and their salaries are easy for right-wing politicians to hack away at.

A good example would be Texas. My mom works for a school district there. In case you're not aware, Texas has decided to balance its' 25 billion dollar 2-year deficit by cutting education to the bone.

My mom says it will be devastating to her district. And not just in getting rid of some useless bureaucrat, or cutting down on ESL classes or something. Every aspect of the education experience is about to take a huge dive and pretty much every employee there is going to be asked to do twice as much, for the same or less pay, with little prospect of higher pay coming down the pipe for years.

Teachers' unions aren't allowed in Texas, and this is the result. When the governor and the legislature badly mis-manage finances - mostly due to tax breaks - THEY pay the price. The idea that Unions who stop this from happening in some states are villains is farcical and completely without merit.

Cycloptichorn

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@Cycloptichorn,

That's easy to say with 20/20 hindsight, but the reality is that even most expert investment specialists got burned.

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@Cycloptichorn,

Of course there is. The unions exist to forward their own interests and hope to drag the public employees along for the ride. I haven't heard a single person say that they have a problem with the people who work in public service jobs. Their unions OTOH are polarizing.

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@JPB,

JPB wrote:

Of course there is. The unions exist to forward their own interests and hope to drag the public employees along for the ride. I haven't heard a single person say that they have a problem with the people who work in public service jobs. Their unions OTOH are polarizing.

Bullshit. They are a convenient boogeyman for the simple-minded, right up there with 'terrorists' and 'socialists!'

Your pejorative views of the unions neither reflect my own personal experience with them or the reported experiences of the millions who are in them.

Nobody on your side of the fence has a problem with the employees, you say; you simply want them all to take huge pay cuts and shut the **** up. Other than that, hey, you think they are great people Rolling Eyes

Please see the update to my above post for some personal evidence of what happens to those employees - the ones you say you have no problem with - when there's no union to represent them.

Cycloptichorn

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@cicerone imposter,

cicerone imposter wrote:

That's easy to say with 20/20 hindsight, but the reality is that even most expert investment specialists got burned.

NO public pension should have been invested in mortgages. But many of them were, heavily. It doesn't take a genius to figure out that in hindsight, many got swept up by the promise of big returns on risky investments.

Just another casualty of the financial crisis, for which nobody has been prosecuted at all, despite the fact that it fucked us all royally.

Cycloptichorn

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@Cycloptichorn,

Cyclo...perhaps you are talking about state and local governments, which I know little about, but you certainly don't understand the Fed Government pay process. Don't you remember the recent stink when Obama froze Government employee wages and the even more recent bugaboo about closing down the Govt this Friday? The President and Congress control how much and or even if Fed Government employees get paid, not so much their manager.

My wife works for the Federal Government. Her salary is defined by a rate table maintained by the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) and approved by Congress or the President. Why do you think the public unions are so intent on giving millions of dollars to the campaign coffers of Congressmen? Because they know that having members of Congress beholden to them is good leverage when that pay scale is going thru it's annual review. The only power my wife's manager has is to offer her a step increase (which incidentally is also controlled by the President and hence currently frozen) or promotion. And promotions, for your information, are always a competitive process, with requisite job advertisement for several days, she must apply, several boards must convene to select the top and eventually best candidate, with documented justification in each step on the process. The process is actually very much like hiring someone off the streets in private industry and never the unilateral decision of her boss.

No...the power (and potential for exploitation) of the government manager over government employees is nothing like the power of a private manager over his employees.

Cyclo wrote:

I think everyone should be; that would be actual 'shared sacrifice.

I agree with you wholeheartedly here. That's where your progressive tax has gone awry. It's no longer progressive for everyone's income but rather only for the middle and upper class.

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@Cycloptichorn,

Double bullshit. You don't know what "my" side of the fence is. I'm not against collective bargaining. I'm against professional middlemen who masquerade as caring father-figures to the masses. Let the teachers form collective bargaining groups all they want. I'm all for it. I've never (and never will be) in support of hiring someone to fight one's battles.

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@Setanta,

Quote:

At the same time, as Cyclo pointed out, he also wants to hand out $150,000,000 in "economic stimulus."

Could either you or Cyclo point me to where Walker proposed this? I did a quick google search but found nothing and find it very hard to believe that a good non-Keynsian like Walker would even come within ten miles of using the term "economic stimulus".

1 Reply

Why the anti-union animosity?

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