What will the new Bargaining Bill correct?

@bobmnu (8157)
United States
March 12, 2011 2:56am CST
I have asked several time what rights are the public employees losing and no one can tell me. I found this article (with references) that shows some of the "rights" that have been bargained and are in the Union Contracts of public employees. You might find it interesting. I saw several ways that the new bargaining law will help the state (all levels of government) save money. check it out http://sunshinereview.org/index.php/Wisconsin_state_government_salary Just changing some of the provisions would not effect services but would reduce costs.
2 people like this
3 responses
@Destiny007 (5805)
• United States
12 Mar 11
Public employees have no need of a union in the first place... and public sector unions should be outlawed as they work against the taxpayers... aka "We the people". In fact, we should outlaw all of the unions and ban them forever from existence in the US. All of these pro-union blowhards are always harping about the EVIL RICH and big business getting to the top at the expense of the "working man", and what the poor saps are too stupid to realize is that it is big labor... and not business... that is getting rich off the working man from forced union dues which are then used to pay for lobbyists and influence elections... and then they cry foul when business is given back their rights for political speech as happened in the Citizens United decision. All employees have the same rights... if they don't like the working conditions, then they can find someplace else to work... or start their own business. Unions are nothing more than a great big scam aimed at raising production costs, making it harder to be profitable, and allowing the union bosses to get rich at the workers expense.... or in the case of public unions, at tax payer expense. Usually their main agenda is to spread socialism... when they are not illegally collecting auto manufacturers.
1 person likes this
• United States
12 Mar 11
I agree. Unions never should have been allowed in the government. Even FDR, quite a liberal/socialist Democrat, understood that. And unions are no longer needed in the private sector.
• United States
12 Mar 11
When people claim that without unions we'll go back to 12-16 hour days, children in the workforce, and making pennies per hour, they're showing their stupidity. That would never be allowed in the U.S. We the people know how to stop those things today.
@anniepa (27955)
• United States
13 Mar 11
If nothing else, this really stuck out for me: "...unions would no longer have a say in workplace safety, conditions or hours. The bottom has dropped out, safety now is purely in the hands of your immediate supervisors' conscience say workers." Let's talk about the supervisors; I'm sure there are some supervisors here on myLot who are great people and who actually have consciences, I've worked for some supervisors who did but I've also worked for some with NONE. If Wisconsin pays out bonuses to management like the USPS does and bases them on keeping hours and costs down, safety becomes a huge concern. Annie
@bobmnu (8157)
• United States
14 Mar 11
You have OSHA laws, Health Codes, building codes (state and local) and in Wisconsin teachers have the right to remove students who "interferes with the ability of the teacher to teach effectively" (http://law.justia.com/codes/wisconsin/2010/118/118.164.html) In my experience as a supervisor in schools the "safety issues" I dealt with seemed to be a noisy heater, or windows that could not be opened (due to state law so that students would not jump out of the windows). As a School Administrator I took safety as a high priority, even though the staff did not and often were knowing the source of the violation. This issue is a smoke screen. What the unions were most upset with was the state no longer forcing all employees to join the union and collecting the union dues for them.
@ParaTed2k (22940)
• Sheboygan, Wisconsin
14 Mar 11
Annie, I don't know how it is in other states, but Wisconsin has the Civil Service at of 1909. Notice the year.. decades before unions became powerful enough to affect change in the workplace. Workplace safety, child labor, redress of grievances, challenging unfair firing.. most of what unions claim credit for is already addressed in this law. That means that Wisconsin public employees have no reason to turn to unions to protect themselves from the kind of supervisors you cite. (which, btw, sadly I agree are out there). There is NOTHING about the collective bargaining here in Wisconsin that puts any importance on keeping costs down. In fact, keeping costs down is openly mocked. I've heard several city and county employees argue that budgets should only be based on what the departments say they need. Each department head should simply submit what they need to the city (county, school board, state). Then the government should simply raise the property taxes enough mils to cover the costs. That is why we now have a situation where we're up to 1/3 of a monthly mortgage payment is taxes. My parents own two houses in Utah, they pay less property taxes for those two houses than I would pay for the house that I rent. And this house is assessed at less value than either of my parents' houses. The fact is, when it comes to the relationship between the local government entities and the unions, there is a lot of collective, but very little bargaining. Even our school districts have direct property tax levy authority. PLUS they draw from the local and state budgets.
1 person likes this
@anniepa (27955)
• United States
20 Mar 11
Ted, despite any of the existing laws you mentioned, without the union the supervisors and Postmasters I've worked for would have gotten away with murder. Annie
@kenzie45230 (3560)
• United States
12 Mar 11
Thanks. That's an excellent reference. If you notice, government union employees accumulate sick time and can convert that into dollars when they retire. So...the sick time they don't use in the first years on the job are paid at the ending rate of pay. Here in Cincinnati, most government workers retire with over $100,000 in unused sick pay. That's absurd. Then they have unused vacation time. And they have pensions to which they contributed next to nothing themselves. These are the things that are bankrupting cities, counties and states. These folks think they are entitled. We, the taxpayers, are fed up with being fleeced.