The other day, I passed along a question from “Terry”, a regular in my comment section:
Why should I be required to work until I’m 70 so you can retire at 55?
Polls, incidents, and other ephemera aside, that really is the only question that matters, in Wisconsin or, really, anywhere. It’s a moral question; is your life, your job, your time on this planet worth so much more than mine that I should be required to pay for you to have that benefit?
Government union workers, for the most part, do the same sort of work all of us in the private sector do. A teacher doesn’t have any voodoo that a corporate trainer doesn’t (indeed, most of the corporate trainers I’ve met started as teachers); a public works employee does the same things a carpenter or block layer or pipefitter or a few dozen other trades do in the private sector. So when one of them asks the rest of us “Could you do my job?”, it’s not like society at large can’t respond “we already do”. Cops and firemen are exceptions – at least partly.
And it’s not like government workers still make the traditional trade-off – lower pay for better benefits. That was the case, not too long ago – but fifty years of union organization have have given unions members pay equal to or better than their private-sector equivalents (in the lower to middle income brackets, at the very least) along with the defined-benefit pensions that add the lifetime salaries for 20-30 years’ work.
So the question remains: why should I have to work until I’m 70 so you can retire at 55?
Someone on Twitter the other day told me “they’re not mutually exclusive”, although he couldn’t say why. The fact is that right now, in this economy, and likely for the rest of my working life, they are mutually exclusive; as my “pension” – my IRA and the value of my home – have shrunk your pension remains a “promise”. And if I can’t pay for that “promise”, the IRS and MN Department of Revenue will make my life hell.
So all you Wisconsin union supporters – please make the moral case: Why should I be required (by the force of law, with tax agents and sheriffs with guns) to work until I’m 70 to (be able to afford, maybe, if I’m lucky) to retire so that you can retire at 55 (and life the rest of your life on money that the full force of the state will extract from me, and my children, and my grandchildren? While I scramble to try to make up the losses of this last three years, likely for the rest of my working life?)
The comment section is yours.
The guy who said “they’re not mutually exclusive” later said he thought everyone should retire at 62, proving he’s from Planet Liberal.
Another union supporter later tweeted that the state government union employees have “better retirement fund managers”. In some cases, no – and it’s irrelevant because, good manager or bad, good times or bad, those “managers” can send people to the legislature to appropriate money to make up any differences between the “promises” and the fund balance. And those “appropriations” come from me. They are collected by the MN Department of Revenue if I cooperate, and a Sheriff’s deputy if I don’t.
Libs just never ever get it.
For all you mealy-mouthed liberals (DG this does mean you and your step-sister peev) who wax poetic about collectivist purity (“fair share” for the private sector) and moral panic (don’t attack the public-sector unions) snap on your Depends, take a big shot of VG and consider:
public-sector teachers in WI make between $45k and $59k a year in salaries a year (a working year that is 13 weeks shorter than the rest of us have ) Plus $22k to $39k in “benefits”. These are not taxed and unlike 401k’s are not limited in how large they can be. Talk about not paying their fair share!!! Best of all for them they pay to elect the people they will be “bargaining” with. Then they get to enforce that bargain.
remember:
“Government is not reason. It is not eloquence. Government is force; like fire it is a dangerous servant — and a fearful master.” —George Washington, 1797
I shall wait until my good friend and co-helper LearnedFoot FACTCHECKS the premise before weighing in.
But we can all take solace in the fact that Heir Leader in the White House had ANOTHER party last night. Perhaps he should change his first name to Nero as he watches the nation burn…
Here Doggie…Doggie…Doggie. Come out and fact check. Where ARE you Doggie?!?!!?
So if police and firemen are a partial exception to the discussion above what about the military?
My neighbor is a psychologist for the Hennepin County Juvenile Justice system and says the biggest difference between today’s juvenile offenders and those of the past is their sense of entitlement. They come into adulthood with expectations that include a lot of amenities which, in the past, were EARNED. Their trouble stems from the fact they expect these goodies without earning them in the conventional sense.
I wonder where this sense of entitlement has its genesis? If these kids have half a brain they’ll steal from a more profitable source – they’ll go to school and get a government job!
Mitch. I too was impressed by the simplicity and insight of Terry’s question. There is no moral case to justify it. Shoplifters rationalize their thefts by assuring themselves that “the store has insurance,” so nobody is hurt. The public-sector union member assures himself that “the rich” will pay. Indeed, didn’t I see that somewhere on an election poster recently?
Still, I’d rather be in the person able to work until 70 rather than in the position of someone at 55 sitting on the marble floor of the Capitol hoping to force someone else to continue sending checks.
The Parasiticrats have taken care not to kill the host, but overspending and the coming plague that is me-titlement spending has weakened our immune system, and it is choking the life out of us.
In response, the Parasiticrats merely latch on harder, suck harder, bite harder, all the while strumming their guitars, doing yoga in rotundas, slashing tires, taking the occasional shower, and pretending the money still grows on trees.
Meanwhile, the rest of us should brush up on our potato planting skills.
what about the military?
They’re not unionized.
Our elected government agreed to give the military union-like benefits. There is some reassessment going on, of course, but they are relatively non-controversial.
On this topic, I think Ann Althouse pointed out this section:
“In the private sector, the capitalist knows that when he negotiates with the union, if he gives away the store, he loses his shirt. In the public sector, the politicians who approve any deal have none of their own money at stake. On the contrary, the more favorably they dispose of union demands, the more likely they are to be the beneficiary of union largess in the next election. It’s the perfect cozy setup.”
From this op-ed by Charles Krauthammer:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/02/24/AR2011022406520.html
Oh no! The above doesn’t look like support for unions? Darn. I’ll try to do better next time. 😉
what about the military?
The pay range for a private 1st class in the Army is $15,892 to $20,776
http://www1.salary.com/E3-Private-First-Class-Army-Salary.html
The pay range for a Seaman in the Navy is exactly the same.
http://www1.salary.com/E3-Seaman-Navy-Salary.html
A Specialist Corporal in the Army? $14,360 to $24,789
http://www1.salary.com/E4-Specialist-Corporal-Army-Salary.html
These people are risking their limbs, their eyes, their very lives and someone is comparing them to public school teachers? Give me a friggin break.
Swiftee calls! To the Fleenmobile!
In a previous thread, Doggone pooped out the following lie:
“Wisconsin had a modest surplus until they recently went into this current fiscal crisis by giving money they didn’t have and couldn’t afford to corporations as inducements….which look a lot like payoffs for campaign contributions.”
FACTCHECK!
http://www.politifact.com/wisconsin/statements/2011/feb/18/rachel-maddow/rachel-maddow-says-wisconsin-track-have-budget-sur/
Can we agree public employee unions are inherently wrong; that they fundamentally work against the taxpayer; that their mission becomes self-perpetuation and not the greater good of the Republic?
Or, is theft legal if it’s done by the government? Do I reside in an alternate reality?
But on a lighter note…..Phyllis Kahn introduced a bill to legalize marijuana as an export crop from Minnesota. I wonder if her pot dealer will get a special deal out of it.
Watched a video of the Wisc Assembly from late last night. Wow, the Democrats are extremely unprofessional.
Chuck,
Phyllis is probably attempting to supplement her income. Its not as if there isn’t already people farming pot down there on Nicolette Island – she just wants in on the take.
The first link goes to a video from the Assembly floor. The second shot from the balconey. What’s with the matching orange T-shirts? The Democrats look like they are on a corporate outing at Valley Fair.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5f0VProvuAo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SGDp581g9t0
Chuck, Phyllis is the Don Fanucci of Nicollet Island, she want “to get her beak wet”.
I’m thinking that’s why Phyllis didn’t want to allow expansion of DeLaSalle football field. Cuts down on that “historic farmland” (wink, wink).
“It’s a moral question”
And therefore subject to rationalization by the immoral purse snatchers.
“And it’s not like government workers still make the traditional trade-off – lower pay for better benefits. That was the case, not too long ago – but fifty years of union organization have have given unions members pay equal to or better than their private-sector equivalents (in the lower to middle income brackets, at the very least) along with the defined-benefit pensions that add the lifetime salaries for 20-30 years’ work.
So the question remains: why should I have to work until I’m 70 so you can retire at 55?”
Can you show me where in the WI public sector unions they retire at 55 with full retirement benefits?
I certainly don’t think anyone should have to work until they are 70 before having the option to retire – it’s not something I would wish on Terry, or you Mitch, or any of your readers, etc.
WCCO’s Sunday morning news did an excellent comparison on 2/20/’11 that showed how the Wisconsin public sector unions compared to the MN equivalent unions in contributions to health care and pensions. In MN the contribution by public sector unions was much higher – and the WI unions have agreed to increase their contributions percentage to less than MN, but to more than they do now. My suspicion is that eventually it will be the same as MN, and most of the corporately employed public sector (union or not), and they should.
Learned Foot, as much as I do dearly love politifact.com, if you may recall my previous comments about fact checking everyone – right, center, and left – even politifact sometimes gets things wrong.
I had that called to my attention recently when an attorney for one of the health care reform litigations contacted me about something I had posted on penigma about the dozen dismissed cases – I was quoting politifact.com.
The law firm erroneoulsy thought I had the contact information for the source of the politifact claim, but I did use their information to make a correction – 3 of 4 claims were dismissed, the fourth was in the process of arguments in a motion to dismiss – but not yet decided.
Sadly, what you posted is another of the VERY RARE occasions where politifact.com is wrong again; Maddow identifies a couple of those instances, not only the one you quoted – here:
http://maddowblog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/02/24/6126053-trms-correspondence-with-politifact?email=html
I think it is important to look at a variety of sources – not only right, centrist/moderate/ or left, and then to look closely at the facts they offer, because I believe that is important to understanding current events, and to having an objective picture of what is taking place. It is just one of the reasons I read what is here periodically (apart from being a fan of Mitch’s writing). If all you read is on the right, you are probably less well informed, particularly as I regularly see grossly inaccurate information from sources like Limbaugh and most of the Murdoch media propagandists.
The sources I cite on penigma reflect that variety of ideology, but I do not provide a link to every single source I use to fact check, only the initial source. Being used by a ‘lefty’ source does not make a fact cease to be a fact, any more than it would do so on the right. The ideology of sources do not matter to what I write, if I am only citing a location where information is posted, so long as that information is accurate and I verify it.
That includes politifact, snopes, factcheck.org – but they are exceptional for providing their sources, making it much easier to fact check them than most other sources of information.
Foot – drive safely in that fleenmobile; you don’t have the emergency to run to that you thought you had.
whoops! “corporately employed public sector (union or not), and they should.” that should have read corporately employed privae sector, sorry!
Chuck Says:
“February 25th, 2011 at 11:28 am
But on a lighter note…..Phyllis Kahn introduced a bill to legalize marijuana as an export crop from Minnesota. I wonder if her pot dealer will get a special deal out of it.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s_Gvc7l2oqU
So does conservative presidential candidate Gary Johnson, one of the most impressive individuals on the right I have seen in years. While I may disagree with a few thing he espouses, his take on cost-benefit analysis, including pot legalization, is fabulous. And he is far from the only conservative to do so, but definitely one of the more eloquent.
If he runs I would seriously consider voting for him.
“I think it is important to look at a variety of sources – not only right, centrist/moderate/ or left, and then to look closely at the facts they offer”
…and when they offer confirmation of your predrawn conclusion, you stop looking. And then, when your called out on it you disappear for days untill you can come up with some plauible sounding bullshit claim to save face. That’s your M.O., and that’s why nobody takes you seriously.
You’re a joke wrapped in a smug little blanet of pretentious sanctamony, covered with a thick film of disingenuousness. Go away.
*fleen*
Dog Gone said: “Can you show me where in the WI public sector unions they retire at 55 with full retirement benefits?”
Legitimate question.
LearnedFoot said: “You’re a joke wrapped in a smug little blanet of pretentious sanctamony, covered with a thick film of disingenuousness. Go away.”
That may be your opinion, however, it doesn’t answer her question.
(note corrections)
Gosh Dog, that’s the longest non mea culpa you’ve written in months. Governor Jim Beam may need another apologist – er – press secretary. Play your card right and you might get your own closet.
DG,
Many of us on the right favor legalizing, or at least decriminalizing, some drugs, including cheeba.
But when you write…:
So does conservative presidential candidate Gary Johnson, one of the most impressive individuals on the right I have seen in years
…it’s as clear a case of Berg’s Eleventh Law Of Inverse Viability as I’ve seen.
DG
“Can you show me where in the WI public sector unions they retire at 55 with full retirement benefits?”
Of course I can.
Here’s a doc from a WEAC local in available in a Word or HTML version, whichever you prefer.
Here’s how teacher’s retirement works (in most states, not just Wisconsin); if your age and years of service add up to over 70, you can retire. The formula for calculating benefits is based on a percentage (and a good percentage!) of your highest salary level for a contract year during your career.
Thus, someone who starts teaching at age 22 can retire at age 46 (46 years old plus 24 years’ teaching=70). They might want to plug away a few more years to get their pay scale up, but it’s pretty much up to the teacher.
You asked. I answered.
I could look and find examples from other unions – but they are more or less similar. Details may vary, but the idea is basically the same.
Teachers pensions are among the biggest-ticket items in most state budgets.
Libertarians, like Marxists, like theory. Doesn’t work out when put into practice.
That may be your opinion, however, it doesn’t answer her question.
C’mon, Nachman — using the same standard Mrs. Teasdale uses, Foot doesn’t have to answer her question until a week from today. But he’ll have to use at least 621 words to do it. Patience.
My worry concerning the current piling on of the Unions by the Republicans is the possible attempt to nullify any form of collective bargaining or representation of workers by a union anywhere including the private sector.
A worker can be walked all over by management, and an injustice done, regardless of whether it is a public or private sector employee. Reigning in excessive union contracts does not have to include a wholesale abrogation of union representation.
Nachman, Mr. D, I’ll do it in 3 words:
What Mitch said.
Also, I’m not all that interested in getting into substantive arguments with an anklebiter; merely shedding some light on her level of integrity. (And it’s that level of integrity that makes having a civil discussion of substance a pointless endeavor.)
Reigning in excessive union contracts does not have to include a wholesale abrogation of union representation.
I agree. I support unions. I’ve been a union member. I support collective bargaining as an element in the free market.
But I oppose unions’ making the market less free – basically using the force of government to negate the market as re their contracts.
Doesn’t work out when put into practice.
That’s an exceptionally broad statement.
Marxism has been field-tested in recent years and found grossly wanting. Libertarianism isn’t as cohesive a theory – there are as many strains as there are Libertarians, from the hard-core crypto-anarchists to people in the GOP who think Ron Paul has some good points but is a little crazy – so you have to look at individual precepts to see when they last had a fair test. No federal currency? Over 100 years ago. No Fed? Around eighty. No federal “social safety net?” Well over 100 years. No comprehensive welfare state? Almost 80. No standing federal Army? Over 200 years.
Would any of them work today? The answers vary, depending on what “work” means.
“You’re a joke wrapped in a smug little blanet of pretentious sanctamony, covered with a thick film of disingenuousness.”
Skin any thinner and there’d be a reservior tip on her head.
I support collective bargaining as an element in the free market.
As do I, however public employment IS NOT the free market.
“I could look and find examples from other unions – but they are more or less similar. Details may vary, but the idea is basically the same.”
I concur here, Mitch. I have a brother that is IBEW (the more enlightened of the two) and another brother that is BrotherHOOD of Railway Signalmen (No women allowed here, man! ;-)) Both of them can retire at 55 with full benefits. IBEW bro gets it – BRS bro in the tank for the union!
Nachman;
I think that an argument could be made against your last paragraph. I think that there is an entirely different atmosphere today.
This is a small sample, but over the past couple of months, I have spoken with several members of the UAW at Ford’s KY and KC plants who all report that overall, they have NEVER seen relations between the parties as great (yes, their words – one a 25 year guy) as they are today. One has to wonder that if the union was pulled out of the equation, could the workers still get a fair compensation package? I firmly believe that they could and here’s why. I once worked for a company that had both union and non-union hourly workers. The union side had more frequent pay raises and better benefits through their union, but they almost went apoplectic when the year end profit sharing checks came out for the non-union side. The average of these checks for similarly tenured workers were between 4 and 6 grand, which most of those workers used as a savings account! Guess which side was most concerned about improving efficiencies and reducing costs?
This would be one way to ween workers off of the union teat.
And in Minnesota, public employees for cities/counties are under the rule of 90. Once your age and length of service to government hit it, you get 80% of your salary…forever. I happen to know a city-level puke, who sucked at the public teet for 35 years (he went into the Army for a handful of years after high school, then came home and took the one-and-only job he ever had) and retired at 55 with full pension.
Yeah, Dimwit Doggie….you sure are smarter and know more and darn it…people like you….
At least Dog Gone and I agree on this much:
“I certainly don’t think anyone should have to work until they are 70 before having the option to retire”
I’ve heard conservative pundits (Medved for one) blithely state that of course the SS retirement age will have to be raised to 70.
Hello? We are not all talk show hosts. Some people are carpenters or nurses. Do you really think a 69-year-old carpenter is going to climb a ladder carrying a hundred pounds of tools and lumber? Is anything sillier than the thought of a 69-year-old nurse rolling a 65-year-old stroke victim so she can give them a sponge bath? She’d have a stroke herself.
Who would hire a 69-year-old to do anything other than a low-paying, warm body position? Before people on the left or right talk about “working ’til your 70′ they need to ensure that there are jobs available for people in their late 60’s.
I pay a little more than 15% of my salary to current retirees via SS and Medicare. I put aside about 15% of my before-tax salary in a 401k. in addition to this about 4% of income goes to the portion of state & county taxes that pay for public employee retirement benefits.
That adds up to about a third of my income paying for retirement benefits for myself and others.
You would think that with that high a percentage of my income being spent on retirement benefits I would be guaranteed a pretty cushy retirement myself (I am on the low end of the highest income quintile).
Not so. Assuming nominal rates of return I will retire at age 66 with an income equal to to 40% of my working income, and that includes SS benefits.
And, as I said, I am in the highest quintile of income earners. I also have a generous 401k. Most people who are not public employees will be far worse off than I will be.
I note nobody has taken on the challenge of “please make the moral case…”
apropos of very little, as an example of how the lefty unions’ urge to grab hold of “theirs” with both fists and kick and scream if anyone dares think about taking their toys away so easily wells up, the Minnesota Nurses are up in arms about WI.
http://mnablog.com/
I don’t have the email, which, um, I saw without the help of someone I know and who has nothing to do with the nurses union, it urged people to go to WI to support, among other things…. the snow plow drivers! *cue anvil sound*
Yes, keep looting the taxpayers, bankrupting states, and holding the public hostage to support the noble snow plow driver!
My aunt retired at age 57 as a Wisc Public school teacher. My sister-in-law said she will be able to retire at age 56.
My father was forced to retire at age 60 because the school districted wanted to bring in lower paid entry level teachers. So school district kind of double pay. They pay in extra for pension costs, give employees decent raises, then have to hire a new teacher so the old teacher’s pay will come out of the state pension bucket.
DG,
I think it is important to look at a variety of sources – not only right, centrist/moderate/ or left, and then to look closely at the facts they offer, because I believe that is important to understanding current events, and to having an objective picture of what is taking place.
It’s a nice principle, but what usually seems to happen is this:
News from “conservative” sources (or putatively conservative ones, like Fox) you treat with great suspicion, demanding a sometimes-absurd amount of “FACT-CHECKING”, to the point where FACT CHECK has become one of this forum’s inside jokes (and you seem to disappear from the discussion when the “conservative” source pans out).
News from “liberal” sources, you seem to present without even the faintest shred of curiosity; your “avalanche of violence” and “conservatives are racist” threads were classic examples of Ready! Fire! Aim! “journalism”. This forum has busted you at this repeatedly.
(Side issue: at the risk of seeming unfair, you seem to have the same conceit most liberals share about conservative forums, thinking them to be just not very intelligent. But the regulars here are far from it; GolfDoc’s an MD, Nate and Foot and Thorley are lawyers, Swiftee and Krod and Master Of None and I think Terry and a few others are engineers, Kevin and Kermit and quite a few others are in IT, BradC and Mr. D are demonstrably sharp guys – and they are pretty darn good at FACT-CHECK…er, working your various claims over. And mine, for that matter. Just saying – condescension to the “Mitchketeers” is a long run off a short rhetorical dock).
Just saying – it all sounds good, but you gotta work on the execution.
I read that there have been approx 46M abortions since ’73. To bad those folks can’t be around to help prop up SS for us Boomers.
It’s easy to make “a long run off a short rhetorical dock” when you need 691 words and 12 paragraphs to make your point.
I might call it pseudo-intellectual B.S.
And DG still has missed the most basic of FACT CHECK on her supposition that Gov. Walker has spent the WI surplus into deficit. He and the Republican majority of the WI legislature was not even sworn into office until last month!
Oh Mitch, your link above to Berg’s Eleventh Law Of Inverse Viability above points to an admin function.
I went to refresh myself as to what the Eleventh Law might be.
Oh Mitch, your link above to Berg’s Eleventh Law Of Inverse Viability above points to an admin function.
Fixed.
DG,
According to Rasmussen – AKA “the accurate poll” – 2/3 of Americans oppose Fleebagging.
Americans – even Democrats – realize what Wisconsin Dems and their supporters do not; that shutting down government to avoid the consequences of losing the election is a repudiation of Democracy.