Today is the opening day of the legislative session. And, as the media tell us with barely-concealed glee, the DFL has a Chicago-like stranglehold on all power in Minnesota this session.
So here are my fearless predictions:
Budget: $40 Billion.
Taxes: Broadly up, with a little window-dressing of “progressivism” to further the class war narrative.
Local Government Aid: Like the alcoholic nephew that keeps hitting his parents up for money “for car repairs/bus fare/new clothes”, Minneapolis and Saint Paul and Duluth will be back begging for more money from the parts of the state that actually work to feed the monkeys on their respective backs. Like your brother’s enabler of a wife, the DFL will go “oh, we can’t just cut you loose!”, and give them what they want.
Daycare unionization: It’ll be rammed through like Roosevelt’s declaration of war. All that union political support don’t come cheap; the purple shirts WANT RESULTS, capisce? With a nod to Scorsese, (audio NSFW) “Day care providers don’t want to unionize? F**k you, pay up! Economy running slow? F**k you, pay up! Parents don’t want it, can’t afford it, and unionizing independent contractors makes no sense? F**k you, pay up!” Look for Dayton to sic the state patrol on non-complying providers by the beginning of next year.
Election Law: Look for the 15 person vouching limit to be raised to eleventy billion. Look for questioning a voter’s qualifications to be re-classifed a felony hate crime.
Gay Marriage: The issue that put the DFL in office?
(Crickets)
You forgot the most likely. Unemployment will increase as more businesses flee the state. As a bonus, we’ll get a light rail line to Stillwater.
Dibble has back tracked on his initial statement that it wouldn’t be a topic of pursuit. I expect that this will hit the docket by mid-year and it will be approved. Even though many of the out state Dems will be committing political suicide, they will knuckle under to their urban brethren.
By the way, Gov. Jim Beam looked stoned yesterday during Tom Bakk’s news conference. He was standing right behind Bakk and appeared to be straining to keep his head up.
But on the other hand….2 months after winning reelection largely by promising no changes to Medicare, Obama said yesterday that he wants to end Medicare as we know it. Like his “illegal warrentless domestic spying”, we hear nothing from the left who threw fits when Republicans said the exact same thing.
The daycare union idea is so unpopular among providers that I talk to that I think forced unionization could be an ultimate win for the GOP. The backlash will be strong and lasting, and only one party will get all the blame.
What would really be wonderful to see is daycare union becoming a trojan horse to the unions. 4-5 thousand pissed off daycare providers, forced to join AFSCME or SEIU, could stage a palace revolt during union elections.
Daycare unionization stretches all, all, all credulity. Next thing you’ll be suggesting is Minnesota will keep shoveling money at light rail.
Yup! On top of their increased day care costs, the libidiots that voted for big government will be paying more taxes, more social security, higher costs for fuel, utilities and food. It’s too bad that their stupidity will cause us all to suffer. I wonder how many providers will have the guts to fire customers that are unionistas?
Let’s say a daycare provider pays the help $10 per hour now. Let’s say it’s a non-profit daycare so nobody is getting dividends at year end; even so, they still need money coming in so the employees can cash their meager paychecks. The money comes from parents whose kids go to that daycare.
The non-profit must charge parents enough to cover the cost of labor and also lights, insurance, etc., so let’s say that right now, parents pay $3 per hour per kid or $125 per week. Suppose the union negotiates the wages up to $20 per hour. That extra cost will be passed along to parents so they will be paying $5 per hour per kid, or $200 per week.
For some parents, that will make daycare so expensive it no longer makes sense to work. Those parents will quit their jobs and stay home with their own kids. As those parents withdraw their kids from daycare, the non-profit either raises its hourly rate to cover the shortage which creates makes daycare unaffordable for even more parents, or the non-profit lays off staff and increases class sizes to reduce labor cost.
Working families and single mothers would get absolutely hammered by this proposal unless . . . government subsidizes them, thereby increasing the percentage of the population reduced to dependency. And now you know why the DFL is all over this proposal.
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A direct or indirect subsidy from the beleaguered taxpayers to low-skilled workers! It’s almost like this was the plan all along!
I know about unions like the SEIU. It unionizes low skilled, high turnover occupations because they are usually poorly educated and have little interest in their jobs other than the paycheck it gives them. It’s union run by the the union bosses, not the workers.
Andy Stern burns workers, employers burn workers. The difference is that Andy Stern is paid to represent their interests.
Terry, in other words, a classic illustration of the term cluster f$#k!
I gotta agree with davethul, unionization of daycare operations doesn’t have any political legs. If that does happen, Democrats can count themselves “out.”