If you can’t beat ‘em with an honest vote, leave town to prevent the legislature from voting. That, of course, is what the Democratic members of the Wisconsin Senate did by going out of state to make sure there could be no vote on Gov. Scott Walker’s proposal to change the law regarding collective bargaining with government employees.
Not surprisingly, the union reaction has been over-the-top with public rallies — including teachers, who are not directly involved in the dispute, while two-thirds of Wisconsin public school eighth-graders can’t read proficiently, despite the highest per-pupil spending in the Midwest. Furthermore, there have been reports that some teachers took students with them to protest without notifying the children’s parents.
The University of Wisconsin has launched an investigation into reports that physicians handed out fake medical excuses to teachers who intended to stay home from work to protest. The director of the Center for Bioethics and Medical Humanities at the Medical College of Wisconsin observed, “When all’s said and done, it’s really the profession of medicine that has the black eye in this case.”
The example being set by Wisconsin’s Democratic legislators and school teachers, many of whom attempted to involve students in their public protests, is beyond just inappropriate — in some instances, it was illegal.
The direct cause of the protests was Walker’s decision to require government workers to pay a larger share of their insurance premiums, and Ohio already has surfaced as the next state to be affected by the issue, with a bill pending in the Legislature to prevent government employees from unionizing.
However, the significance of the strife in Ohio and Wisconsin goes beyond these two states. It is merely the forerunner of a wave of defaults that is already beginning to sweep across America, which started with the failure of Vallejo, an East Bay city that filed bankruptcy in 2008.
Wisconsin is faced with a $3.6 billion budget shortfall and a constitutional prohibition against running a deficit, which leaves Walker little room to compromise his demand that the government unions agree to pay a larger portion of their health insurance premiums. He has warned that state employees could start receiving layoff notices soon if a bill eliminating most collective bargaining rights is not passed.
Media reports have highlighted government entities around the country that are being forced to deal with the reality that they cannot continue to provide wages and benefits to their employees that far exceed those in the private sector. California and many of its county and city governments are facing budget shortfalls that they’re unable to fund, which pits them against their workers.
Many people are surprised to learn that President Franklin D. Roosevelt, whose administration heralded the dawn of modern unionism, was openly opposed to giving bargaining rights to government unions. In 1937, Roosevelt wrote: “The process of collective bargaining, as usually understood, cannot be transplanted into the public service. … I want to emphasize my conviction that militant tactics have no place (in the public sector). … A strike of public employees manifests nothing less than an intent on their part to prevent or obstruct the operations of government.”
Yet, here we are, 70-plus years later, dealing with the very problem FDR warned against.
However, the question is not, “How did we get to this point?” It is or should be, “What do we do now?”
The answer to the first question, of course, is that too many of the people in public office have been intimidated by government unions, which generally contribute to and campaign for candidates who favor their demands.
As for “What do we do now?” it helps that the public is becoming increasingly aware of the problem and is losing patience with government workers who steadfastly defend their compensation and benefits, demanding that the public pay ever higher taxes to cover the costs. People are increasingly fed up with the unreasonable demands of government workers, while they (the public) have been having a tough time making ends meet in a down economy.
The issue of anti-union legislation has already begun to surface in other states, notably California, Indiana and Ohio. In California, new Gov. Jerry Brown has already proposed a budget that would make changes to the pension plans for new government hires. The Sacramento Bee noted: “Fiscal experts warn that California faces growing debt in the form of pension liabilities. … The Legislative Analyst’s Office recommended this month that lawmakers take further steps to reduce pensions across the state and local governments.”
It’s time that we all face reality.
— Harris R. Sherline is a retired CPA and former chairman and CEO of Santa Ynez Valley Hospital who as lived in Santa Barbara County for more than 30 years. He stays active writing opinion columns and his blog, Opinionfest.com.