Posted on 01/03/2011 5:33:41 PM PST by Libloather
As governments go broke, public employee unions must share the pain
By: Examiner Editorial 12/28/10 8:05 PM
One need look no further than two Michigan officials -- William Cooper, the city manager of Hamtramck, and Tom White, associate director for labor relations of the Michigan Association of School Boards -- to grasp the seriousness of the financial crisis exploding across this country. Cooper told the New York Times that his city government "maybe" can pay its bills through March 1. Hamtramck has already cut what it could from its budget, reducing spending for parks, senior centers and road maintenance. Now city leaders say their only remaining option is to file a municipal bankruptcy. If Hamtramck is allowed to do that, according to the Times, at least another 30 Michigan cities will quickly follow suit, so state government leaders aren't likely to permit such bankruptcy filings.
**SNIP**
It is no coincidence that President Obama and congressional Democrats want federal taxpayers to bail out state and local governments in order to save municipal jobs and services. The real beneficiaries of the bailouts would be the very public employee unions whose excessively generous pay and benefits caused the fiscal crises. Sooner or later, union leaders must realize the only alternative to major concessions today is facing the reality of no benefits being paid at all tomorrow. And voters should reject politicians who lack the will to confront unions on this issue.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonexaminer.com ...
Be careful about “share” the pain. Their benefits skyrocketed for years and now everyone has to share in the pain? Hardly. When a company goes bankrupt, its workers get fired and they lose their benefits. That is what should happen to government workers. Pound the pavement looking for work like the rest of us peasants.
“As governments go broke, public employee unions must share the pain”
Considering the fact that they’re mostly to blame they shouldn’t just share the pain but own it. And I would start with the cowardly politicos that conspired with them in the first place.
There won't be any real slashing unless the bondholders and/or other creditors are going to take a haircut. 'Tis the nature of bankruptcy.
....”When a city goes bankrupt, doesn’t that end pension payments?”
yes that’s what they say....also it means that people holding municipal bonds are screwed too.
SHARE the pain! How about this:
My sister worked for Sears for 30 years and had a Defined pension benefit of about $2K per month.
When Sears sold itself off her Defined pension was thrown out and she ended up with a 401K and had to start from zero dollars. This after about 20 years of employment.
When she retired she got a lump sum of about $60K. That is it.
Let all those public employees take a big hit since most of the rest of us have had to take hits also. They do not deserve more than us since we have to foot their bill. They have been sucking off the Government tit for too long.
The hubris of the Government employee is astounding.
Amen to that!!!!
not if they just hand it to the feds and get bailed out
"The hubris of the Government employee is astounding."
The TRUTH has been spoken!
Local, State, Federal...
:-)
“When a city goes bankrupt, doesn’t that end pension payments?”
It do in the private sector. But,in the “public sector” the money just grows on trees.
When a city goes bankrupt, it doesn’t normally end pension payments. Usually what happens is the retirees sue the city and a judge requires the city to continue pension payments, even if it means big tax increases for city residents and slashing city services. This is because pension obligations have the legally binding nature of a contract.
This is why reducing pension benefits is always focused on new hires and sometimes current employees, not for current retirees.
How can the state stop them? If they default on their obligations, what other recourse do they have?
By law all outstanding pay for work already performed gets first dibs. Bondholders are second and everything else comes after that.
Still, it will be a State Judge that ultimately determines the disposition of all claimants and there's no telling what kind of screwy-a$$ed sh!t they might come up with.
They ONLY thing the Judge will not have the power to order is a tax increase...and there's some question about whether they could end Garbage, Water etc.
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