Sunday, February 13, 2011

And Now For The REAL Facts About Public Sector Workers

1) Public employees have already made painful cuts to keep government running:

State workers have already taken 16 days of furloughs, equivalent to a three percent cut in pay.  Between the furloughs and other concessions, state workers have saved tax payers more than $100 million.

Milwaukee County workers have taken 26 furlough days in 2010 and our in the process of having to take another 26 in 2011.  This is equivalent to a ten percent cut in pay and does not include pay freezes, higher payments to health care and other savings measures.

The City of Milwaukee workers had to give up to four furlough days and make other concessions.

2) Public employees in Wisconsin make 4.8 % less than their counterparts in the private sector:

The Economic Policy Institute found that Wisconsin public employees are paid 4.8% less than private sector workers with similar education levels.

In order for Scott Walker to bring public sector worker's salaries and benefits in line with the private sector, as he claims he wants to do, he'd have to give them all 5% raises. (Now that I could go for!)

3) The State's Pension Fund is fully funded and face no crisis:

So is the City of Milwaukee's pension fund.

The only one that is a mess is Milwaukee County's and guess who was in charge of that one.

4) Walker ignores the real cause, and the real solution, the current fiscal problems the state is facing:

Walker blames the state's fiscal mess on the public sector nurses, teachers, doctors, social workers and other workers.  This is not only wrong, it's stupidly dishonest.  Anyone who is paying attention already knows that the main problems is the Wall Street induced global economic meltdown.

If Walker was interested, really interested, in fixing the economy, he would be creating new revenue. To do that, he needs to put Wisconsinites back to work by investing in our infrastructure like repairing roads, bridges and schools.

Another big time solution would be to actually get the tax scofflaws to pay the taxes their supposed to be paying.  And by tax scofflaws, I mean, of course, the more than 60% of business that make over $100 million each year, but don't pay a dime in taxes.  If Walker would face up to his masters, he could easily collect another $1.2 billion dollars.  Yes, that's billion, with a capital B.

5) Walker's tax and spending cuts aren't about creating jobs, they're about making the rich richer:

The corporations and fat cats that have backed Walker, such WMC and the Koch brothers don't give a damn about us as citizens, whether we are working or not, whether we keep our homes or not, whether we live or not.

The only thing they care about is increasing their own wealth, by buying political puppets like Walker who then give them huge tax breaks and grants, calling it "investments."  But these same miscreants call job creation, like maintaining our infrastructure, or having teachers, nurses, social workers as "wasteful spending."

And this is happening across the country.  Look at the other sociopaths that should never have been elected, like in Ohio, New Jersey, and Florida, just to name a few.

Oh, and they're not done yet.  The crooked Koch brothers, who pay for the teabaggers and front groups like Americans for (the rich's) Prosperity (not yours), have already committed $88 million to the 2012 elections.

4 comments:

  1. Of that $1.2 Billion looks like the largest component by far is individual income tax (arourn $700 million). The corporate portion is only about $100 million.

    I just don't think we are going to fix a $3 billion deficit through higher taxes on businesses.

    We have to get serious about how much and how we spend our money. This is true regardless of what one think's of Walker's specific proposals in this case.

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  2. You can't fix a deficit hole that big just by cutting spending. That's only part of the solution (state workers acknowledged it - the erstwhile contracts that the legislature rejected included tens of millions in concessions). You have to increase revenue, too. For starters, think about adding a half a percent to the sales tax. My estimate (thanks again to the Google) comes to $400 million in revenue for a half point increase. Given a choice between making our state look like Mississippi or paying another 50 cents on a $100 purchase, I know what I'd choose.

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  3. I would have to see specific proof that a company making 100B pays nothing in taxes, just propaganda. And if 26 furlough days is equal to a 10% pay cut they really do make to much because 26 days times my hourly pay just isn't that much to get this excited about. Everyone is just looking for somethng for nothing. Everyone wants the budget balanced but they just want the neighbor next door to be the one to pay it. It's time to get serious and relize we have a a big problem and if not gotten under control none of us will have to worry about our pension or other things we won't have jobs at all. They should have to pay the same percentage of their health care and pensions as my family does. No sympahty here.

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  4. The budget actually had a surplus until Walker took office. Giving his campaign supporters big tax breaks and other gifts turned a $120M surplus into a $170M deficit. Let Walker pay for his own mess.

    Secondly, the working class isn't whining about money. They fight for their rights, their dignity and our democracy.

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