I don’t know why I do this to myself, but while skimming an article in the New York Times, I couldn’t resist clicking on a link to Paul Krugman’s latest column. After wrapping a couple of turns of duct tape around my noggin, I clicked away.
Opining on the budget showdown in Wisconsin, Krugman tries to advance the same misguided memes as the rest of the LSM, namely:
- Governor Walker wants to strip away the collective bargaining rights of the unions because it’s about power, and not the budget
- Public sector workers are paid less than their private-sector counterparts
- Maintaining the Wisconsin unions’ collective bargaining rights intact will help balance the power between middle-class Americans and the (ever-looming, always evil) wealthy oligarchs who are forcing the workers to perform labor for unfair wages and benefits.
Let’s take a look at those claims:
- Krugman says limiting the unrestrained collective bargaining rights of the public sector unions is not about the budget; it’s about power. My retort is simple: elections matter. The Governor is doing what the citizens of Wisconsin elected him to do. Wisconsin has a
constitutional requirement to balance the budget, and one of the factors that continually injects uncertainty into the budget-balancing equation is the insatiable maw of the public sector unions. In one video presentation I watched, a state senator from Wisconsin said the last collective bargaining negotiation took 18 months, and that was with a Democrat-controlled legislature. The bill doesn’t take away the unions’ right to bargain on wages; only on health benefits and pensions. The Wisconsin unions pay less than their counterparts in other states for these benefits, and way less than workers in the private sector. I pay about 1/2 of my health care insurance premium, and 100% of my retirement fund (my company is generous enough to match a portion of what I contribute, but if I don’t pony up, neither do they). If Krugman and the rest of the left is really interested in fairness and equality, why is it so reprehensible to demand a little fairness and equality from them? - This is a tired, tired, left-wing meme that only passes with indolent Obamabots who won’t pull their heads out of the sand. Here’s an exhibit (to the right of the column) that will quickly and convincingly dispel this myth. It’s pretty clear that public workers, on average, are making significantly more than their counterparts in the private sector. You can easily find more evidence to refute his claim here, here, here, and here (I could go on, but you get the point).
- Public sector union workers in Wisconsin (and everywhere else) don’t work for those filthy-lucre oligarchs that aren’t paying their fair share of taxes, dimbulb. They work for the taxpayers – and the taxpayers have voted for someone (finally) that will execute on their desire to limit the unfettered power of the unions to extract more and more pay and benefits for less and less work. In Wisconsin, there was no balance of power – the have grown accustomed to getting what they want, regardless of who it inconveniences. If the bill passes, there will be some semblance of balance between the desires of the unions, and the fiscal limitations of the taxpayers.
I don’t have anything against rank-and-file union workers who joined up to gain some measure of security – you want to belong to a union, go ahead; it’s your dues money. The problem is, in Wisconsin and elsewhere, the dues get funneled to Democrat candidates who will capitulate to the unions’ demands, and the lowly taxpayer who funds the enterprise is left holding the bag – and the bill. In Wisconsin, the taxpayers have said “enough.”
