Unintended Consequences

The wisdom of Scott Walker’s approach is being hailed by…

Wisconsin’s Teachers unions?

Or at least, that fraction of their mlembers that weren’t laid off, as we were warned they’d be?

Huh-wha?

When debate over public unions flared up in Wisconsin last year, educators claimed Gov. Scott Walker’s austere reforms would require thousands of teachers to be laid off.
They were wrong.
With small changes in pension and healthcare contributions while allowing school districts to buy health insurance plans on the open market, Walker’s reforms have resulted in what could be considered a statewide teacher-retention program. School districts such as Wauwatosa, hometown of Governor Walker and the Weekly Standard’s Fox News star Stephen Hayes, faced a $6.5 million deficit and planned to lay off dozens of teachers. But Walker’s reforms allowed all those teachers to remain employed.
At other large school districts such as LaCrosse, Racine, Wausau, and Beloit, if there were any layoffs at all, they were limited to two or fewer. And in addition to retaining teachers, the reforms have instituted merit-based pay systems that allow excellent teachers to be rewarded.

But was there a catch?

Silly wiberwal wabbits. There’s always a catch – and it comes from your side:

However, not all school districts adopted Walker’s reforms so readily. Milwaukee’s school district, which is immediately east of Wauwatosa, rammed through a union contact in December, just in time to avoid being subject to the reforms.
Now it appears the Milwaukee district is reconsidering its hasty action.

The Walker “Recall”, combined with the onset of Obamacare and Obama’s microphone flub with Medvedev, might be just about the best thing to happen to the GOP this year.

More recalls like this, and Walker might be the Presdent next year.

(Via commenter Bosshoss429)

2 thoughts on “Unintended Consequences

  1. Thanks, Mitch! I thought that it was one of the best rebuttals to the union lies that I have seen lately.

  2. One reason, in my opinion, is that the left wants to recall Governor Walker this year, is that they believe the reforms will work. Once it is shown that said reforms are working in Wisconsin and balancing the budget with minimal layoffs, they lose. Hence the rush to recall and reverse the law before its benefits are apparent.

    But the law is working already. So good news for Walker and other progressive (old definition) reformers.

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