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August 10, 2010
The Government's Business Model
It's quite model the U.S. government has created for itself, as an entity, and the Democrats have made its principles undeniably clear with their ownership of power:
Spending more on border security commands bipartisan support, but the jobs bill, which narrowly passed the Senate, is being described in starkly different political terms. Democrats say it could save the jobs of more than 300,000 teachers, police officers and other public health workers. Republicans see it as more profligate government spending and a pre-election gift to teachers' unions and other public service unions that are crucial to helping keep Democrats in the majority.The legislation provides $10 billion to school districts to rehire laid-off teachers or ensure that more teachers won't be let go before the new school year begins. The money could keep more than 160,000 teachers, including 16,000 in California and 14,000 in Texas, on the job, advocates say.
The other half of the bill has $16 billion for six more months of increased Medicaid payments to the states. That would free up money for states to meet other budget priorities, including keeping more than 150,000 police officers and other public workers on the payroll. Some three-fifths of states have already factored in the federal money in drawing up their budgets for the current fiscal year.
With all tiers of government unable to operate in ways that maintain their workforces — and reluctant to trim unnecessary labor — the feds are simply borrowing money against the livelihoods of future taxpayers to fill the gap. They're taking money from the private sector to insulate their own employees against the combination of mismanagement and hard economic times. Conveniently, since government employees can vote for their employers, the larger government gets, the greater its directly bought and paid voting bloc becomes.
This is what way-too-big government looks like, and the trend must be reversed.
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And the Republicans are different how?
Posted by: michael at August 10, 2010 4:22 PMJustin,
OK……Let’s just repeal the law and take back the $26 billion.
Let the 300,000 teachers, police and firemen in the cities and towns of America rot. Go on unemployment or welfare plus possible housing foreclosures and loss of taxpayer and purchasing neighborhood income swelling the already national staggering ranks.
There are vast consequences of the trickledown effect of throwing a vast amount of public servants under the bus.
You dislike teacher unions but what are you going to do when the town has to start closing schools because of lack of teachers or you call 911 for police and fire department help and they tell you take a number you’ll be attended to in the order of the number assigned to you.
You have not suggested or offered an alternative to the problem.
You only complain.
Posted by: Ken at August 10, 2010 7:36 PMKen,
Why is it always the "teachers, policemen and firemen"? Why not a junior assistant clerk, or two, in the Planning Department. Surely the Parks Department could handle a "reduction in staff". Perhaps the Highway Department "could take it". For the last few days I have been passing a Water Dept. project, I have seen the same guy just walking around, doing practically nothing.
I have noticed that they are adding a steel fire escape to the court house in Attleboro, MA. This may seem unimportant. Well, try adding a steel fire escape to a private project in Attleboro, ain't never going to happen. I also noticed it is taking up a lot of the front lawn, can't interfere with those parking spaces for the county employees (actually I think the state has taken it over from the counties in MA)
Posted by: Warrington Faust at August 10, 2010 9:35 PMWarrington Faust,
I don’t know why it’s always the teachers, police and firemen that get hit? Maybe because they are essential services to life and safety and the powers to be always think someone or some resource will wave a magic wand. Maybe because they are so public and held to such high ethical standards that when one fails public sentiment is they all must be bad therefore they all need to be replaced. I noticed teachers are held in higher respect in this state than back on the mainland states. No one bad mouths teachers here and parents actually go into schools to paint, clean, landscape the schools as part of community pride.
Republican Governor Linda Lingle was trying to balance the two year state budget. She brokered a deal where all state managers took a 10% pay cut and 17 furlough days per year for next two years. She asked the unions to do the same but blue collar state employees take a 5% cut and the 17 furlough days per year. To her surprise all the unions (state is the 2nd most unionized state in the nation) got a yes from the rank and file we will share the pain to protect everyone from layoffs.
Everything was going along great till the first furlough Friday and schools were closed (teachers work for the state because the state runs the school system). Parents went ballistic and there were law suits filed because the children’s education was being cut from 180 days of education to 163 days shortest school year in the nation. Washington, DC jumped in and even commented that it was wrong to balance the state budget on the backs of helpless school children. The 17 days stood for last year but the private banks promised an unsecured no interest $10 million loan to the school department to fill in the 17 furlough days this year so the children will have a full 180 day school year. To everyone’s surprise, state-wide standardized testing scores did not drop as expected even in the lowest achieving schools! The scores actually got a little better!
The City and County also has a furlough program to balance their two year budget but the minimum property tax was raised from $100 to $300 a year (if your homeowner and age exemptions are so great that your property tax falls below the minimum you must pay the minimum tax so everyone paying $100 actually got a $200 tax raise) and that is helping to mitigate the furloughs with the police, firemen and EMTs. They are on a rolling furlough schedule for the next year so no station will be left with skeleton crew.
We are getting back to normal and the recession is clearing. Our unemployment is falling placing us #6 ranking for top 10 states with lowest unemployment in the nation. Tourists are coming back in droves and airlines have almost replaced all the flight seats lost to 2 airline bankruptcies. The statewide tax income is climbing back up so services will get back to normal faster.
Posted by: Ken at August 11, 2010 1:50 AM