It's way more complex than "unions"---way more. If you read her article closely, you see the problem:
"The primary reasons for bankruptcy were due to plummeting sales and property tax revenue – we lost 20 percent of our general fund in 18 months"
What's true for Vallejo holds true for the Federal government and for your home town as well.
The second aspect of this complexity is that public service unions justifiably ask: "Why do WE have to take the hit? Why don't all the fat cats take the hit? Why is "entrepreneurship" a sacrament and "pension" a sin?
Why, if you sit behind a desk at the county clerk's office, you are a parasitic leech, but if you sit behind a big walnut desk at GM or Ford you are a brilliant hard-working "executive"?
Yeah, WHY?
Are we SURE this is how we want to save money? Are we SURE we want our cars built by people with no job security and no "up" in their job skills?
@MrShift@Edmunds said:
It's way more complex than "unions"---way more. If you read her article closely, you see the problem:
What's true for Vallejo holds true for the Federal government and for your home town as well.
The second aspect of this complexity is that public service unions justifiably ask: "Why do WE have to take the hit? Why don't all the fat cats take the hit? Why is "entrepreneurship" a sacrament and "pension" a sin?
Why, if you sit behind a desk at the county clerk's office, you are a parasitic leech, but if you sit behind a big walnut desk at GM or Ford you are a brilliant hard-working "executive"?
Yeah, WHY?
Are we SURE this is how we want to save money? Are we SURE we want our cars built by people with no job security and no "up" in their job skills?
I repeat myself. I have no problem with UAW workers making as much money as the market will allow. That is somewhat controlled by the market place. My point is Trade Unions like my Teamsters and UAW are thrown into the same basket as the Public employee Unions. Which is what the tax payers see in their faces on a daily basis. Public servants making WAY MORE in most cases than the average tax payer. Then they retire at a young age with a HUGE pension that is on the backs of those same tax payers.
Cincinnati for one, are low on funding because the city kept putting off the required paying the funds in--because it was more fund to spend the money on something else rather than fund the pensions of the workers. Now they owe huge amounts to the pension fund, and they are hoping to put in some money and have the state taxpayers take over the deficit in the pension fund by absorbing the workers into a state pension fund. That's the taxpayers subsidizing the city even more than the two huge stadiums for the Reds and Bengals we helped pay for.
I don't know how Ohio pensions are compared to CA. I would imagine they are more in line with the general public. CA public employees have the cream of the crop jobs in the state outside the limo Liberal Dot.commers in the San Francisco area. When there are cities going bankrupt and the public employees do not want to share in the pain, it hurts all of US. When you have 1000s of public employees retiring at a very young age with huge pensions someone has to pay those. I don't want to be one of those people. Funding is also based on average life expectancies which are going up very fast for seniors. The pensions do not get cut off at 74.5 years of age.
"Overall bankrupt municipalities remain extremely rare. A Governing analysis estimated only one of every 1,668 eligible general-purpose local governments (0.06 percent) filed for bankruptcy protection over the past five years. Excluding filings later dismissed, only one of every 2,710 eligible localities filed since 2008." (governing.com)
That's 0.06%. Much ado about not much, but it makes for juicy headlines I suppose. Looks like it's Nebraska that needs to get its [expletive deleted] together. (journalstar.com)
In union news, there isn't anything new. The UAW appeals process is in the works and VW is mum on a new SUV line.
The tax payers that are not getting fairly represented. Legislators, council people, and Congress are all being bought by the highest bidders. Which in many cases are the Unions. Especially public employee unions like NEA and SEIU. It feeds on itself like cancer and next thing you know the city is in debt and cannot pay the bills.
I realize cities like Vallejo lost a lot of money when they forced the Navy out. Who's fault was that? I lived in a quonset hut there in 1952 while my stepdad was getting discharged from the Navy. Seemed like a busy place then.
"Then they retire at a young age with a HUGE pension that is on the backs of those same tax payers."
Exactly. That's probably the grandest waste out of all of it, even more than any other organized benefits that don't exist in the rest of the working world. In for 25-out with 85 and similar idiotic schemes simply shouldn't exist, when they are only available to a few, while the rest pay for it. Pensions shouldn't be subsidized by taxpayers, many of whom will have a far more difficult time in retirement than those they aid. You receive based on what you paid.
Until it is available to the working world in general, it shouldn't be available to only one group, one that usually already has work rules (tenure-based promotion and stability) that most private sector workers couldn't dream of.
But I thought carving out a cushy little niche for yourself was admirable in this country--why do we feel okay about the entrepreneur who makes a bundle and "works hard" but somehow spending 20+ years in some dusty municipal office is thought of as a lark? Don't we all look for the best deals, the house with the best lot site, the best schools for our kids?
Why aren't these "injustices"? Our gain is certainly someone else's loss--we just moved faster, or were smarter. It's not like your local fireman stole, bribed, cheated and lied his way in. And what kept you from becoming a fireman?
Some people don't like having flaming roofs fall in on them or don't want to wind up in hospital four plus times over their career, like my Boise neighbor. I think his longest stay was 3 weeks while they patched up his back from a work injury.
@MrShift@Edmunds said:
But I thought carving out a cushy little niche for yourself was admirable in this country--why do we feel okay about the entrepreneur who makes a bundle and "works hard" but somehow spending 20+ years in some dusty municipal office is thought of as a lark? Don't we all look for the best deals, the house with the best lot site, the best schools for our kids?
Why aren't these "injustices"? Our gain is certainly someone else's loss--we just moved faster, or were smarter. It's not like your local fireman stole, bribed, cheated and lied his way in. And what kept you from becoming a fireman?
The job is PUBLIC SERVANT. Yes they are entitled to a living wage. Using their influence via the Unions should not give them an unfair advantage at carving that niche over the people paying their wages and benefits. They should be held to the median income for the area. If they don't like the pay as a fireman in Vallejo move to San Francisco where everyone is a Billionaire and can afford $200k per year firemen. I see public employee unions more like the armies of Alexander the Great, going into towns raping and pillaging. At least that is how I feel every Spring when I start putting all my taxes together. I also don't see much for the money spent.
The state is screwing over the more affluent areas with their school money. Could be another reason the Silicon Valley bunch want their own state. This is the reason we just had to cut our teacher's pay.
In the past five years the district has used reserve to funds, but these will run out by 2015. The need for the bond stems from a loss of state funding. In the past schools were funded based on the number of students.
Then last year Governor Jerry Brown and state legislature crafted the Local School Funding formula (LSFF) that gives schools with English language learners and economically disadvantage students more money. “LSFF has changed the way we operate here in Coronado, perhaps forever,” Felix said.
If we're going to use that red herring, what amount of pension debt is created by firemen? Probably a fraction compared to LEOs and paper pushers.
Why answer questions with questions? Why should one subset received a subsidized unearned retirement in perpetuity on the backs of the public at large? Why aren't such schemes available to everyone?
@MrShift@Edmunds said:
But I thought carving out a cushy little niche for yourself was admirable in this country--why do we feel okay about the entrepreneur who makes a bundle and "works hard" but somehow spending 20+ years in some dusty municipal office is thought of as a lark? Don't we all look for the best deals, the house with the best lot site, the best schools for our kids?
Why aren't these "injustices"? Our gain is certainly someone else's loss--we just moved faster, or were smarter. It's not like your local fireman stole, bribed, cheated and lied his way in. And what kept you from becoming a fireman?
But such schemes ARE available to everyone--all you have to do is want that kind of job. As for the term "servant"--well, all politicians are public servants in theory but they make good salaries, have good bennies, and are, by and large, not nearly as smart as your fireman--in fact, you can be shockingly stupid and rise quite high in public office. And they VOTE on these budgets.
I think the ire of the public is quite misdirected when it comes to unions.
that's easy. They are the best fund-raisers. Colleges are now a business....the students are the clients, and the classes are the product. If the students don't like the product, they take their tuition elsewhere. So the top tier at colleges have to be charismatic, and very good salesmen. They don't even have to be smart. The smart ones, the professors, are service providers, and they try not to offend the customers with an "F" grade for anything, ever.
@MrShift@Edmunds said:
that's easy. They are the best fund-raisers. Colleges are now a business....the students are the clients, and the classes are the product. If the students don't like the product, they take their tuition elsewhere. So the top tier at colleges have to be charismatic, and very good salesmen. They don't even have to be smart. The smart ones, the professors, are service providers, and they try not to offend the customers with an "F" grade for anything, ever.
If that were the case they should hire Televangelists. Many of them are proven fund raisers. I say it is political paybacks. Napolitano will not have to teach a class and I cannot imagine anyone picking a school because she is top dog. Reich, Chu, Condi Rice may have some $ draw. It just makes going to college more expensive. We are a disgrace when it comes to the cost of higher education and it is because of over paid public servants.
That's a cop out, get real. Not everyone can even get close those jobs - there aren't nearly enough to go around, and much of it doesn't seem to be merit based - seems to stay in the family, especially in smaller towns.
Unions aren't the issue on this black hole of taxpayer expenses subject, as the pensions exist in large volumes outside of unions, but not outside of the public sector. Why should this sector be entitled to lifetime pensions, when virtually nobody else has such an entitlement in modern times? Why can't I get such a guaranteed return on my retirement investments? I could justify such perks for those who really put something on the line - but that's a small minority of those who retire at 60 or before and live much more comfortably than most, while not worrying, and not actually having funded the real value of their benefits.
@MrShift@Edmunds said:
But such schemes ARE available to everyone--all you have to do is want that kind of job. As for the term "servant"--well, all politicians are public servants in theory but they make good salaries, have good bennies, and are, by and large, not nearly as smart as your fireman--in fact, you can be shockingly stupid and rise quite high in public office. And they VOTE on these budgets.
I think the ire of the public is quite misdirected when it comes to unions.
One place the UAW won't succeed - Jawjuh. I don't think they'd even try. Those TN wages would buy even more in much of GA, probably no need to even try.
@Stever@Edmunds said:
Round and round we go, convincing nobody, that's the name of the show.
Meanwhile, maybe someone can pop in here with something related to the UAW.
Just read this long breakdown of the auto bailout. And how the UAW really made out like bandits. Speaking of politicians getting involved in such matters it is quite clear Obama was not adverse to pushing his own illegal agenda. As well as Bush at the beginning. So the tax payers fix the UAW pension fund and screw the Indiana teachers and firemen's fund.
Of the two proceedings, Chrysler's was clearly the more egregious. In the years leading up to the economic crisis, Chrysler had been unable to acquire routine financing and so had been forced to turn to so-called secured debt in order to fund its operations. Secured debt takes first priority in payment; it is also typically preserved during bankruptcy under what is referred to as the "absolute priority" rule — since the lender of secured debt offers a loan to a troubled borrower only because he is guaranteed first repayment when the loan is up. In the Chrysler case, however, creditors who held the company's secured bonds were steamrolled into accepting 29 cents on the dollar for their loans. Meanwhile, the underfunded pension plans of the United Auto Workers — unsecured creditors, but possessed of better political connections — received more than 40 cents on the dollar.
In a now-infamous speech in April 2009, President Obama publicly attacked these investors — who were merely standing up for their contract and property rights — as profiteers, criticizing them for their unwillingness to make the same sacrifices as other investors (but not, of course, UAW members, who received a windfall). In response to this public browbeating from the president of the United States, the hedge funds caved and agreed to the terms. In the end, only one group of Chrysler bond holders — the Indiana state teacher and police pension funds — continued to object. Indeed, they objected at every stage of the process, but the Supreme Court declined to hear their case.
The author of that article sounds like a conclusion in tortured search of isolated facts to support it--further, the airy dismissal of probability is pretty interesting.
(quote, in response to the idea that without a bailout, GM and Chrysler would have gone bankrupt and been dismantled).....
"But this nightmare scenario was never likely to happen."
Really? Did his crystal ball tell him that?
And THEN he says:
"It is possible that Chrysler would have then faced liquidation "
Whoa?? I thought this couldn't happen?
And THEN he says:
"General Motors, however, would almost certainly have been re-organized. In all likelihood, this re-organization would have produced a company more competitive than the one that emerged from the bailout process."
More competitive than as competitive as it is now? Like....10% more competitive, or ....?
and THEN he says:
"in truth, however, the use of TARP funds to bail out GM and Chrysler most likely violated the law. "
Even though the Supreme Court held the challenge moot.
I simply don't find this article worthy of the magazine's usual standard of scholarship.
Here's a much more interesting point of view from FORBES, in my opinion:
Just being in a state like California would be taxing. From the actual taxes, that is. Yikes. What shifty said makes a lot of sense, though, because this is the land of the free, right? Free ta do the Elon Musk thing and make the best all-electric car and make a crunch-load of money from it. Or a rocket ship that will take passengers to Mars (or whatever other thing he is actively working on).
Now, from gagrice's view a bit more, why should these "public servant" people make as much as they do (in some public groups) and why should they get a bigger pension payment than it seems the average American wage-earner makes while they work their active job? Oh, I know. They can because they belong to the UAW...I mean their local public-service union.
You might very well be right, stever. I haven't taken much time ta click on that story, even though Carlsbad is only about 175 miles SE of us here in Alamo. Sounds potentially very scary, at least it's not a Hanford-type disaster where downdrifting winds are involved, right?
Taxes? Everybody wants a perfect world and nobody wants to pay for it.
The problem is, of course, is that people like to SEE things happening with their money.
I myself was content to see a resurgent Detroit auto industry propped up by TARP money, but some people wanted that PLUS a profit for the US gov on GM stock sales. Can't blame 'em for thinking that.
The winds are heading for the panhandle of Texas so you should be "safe". Just funny how stuff that's never supposed to happen keeps happening all too frequently. There's only 13 workers exposed to plutonium and americium that's been reported.
But what are you going to do in the face of big corp or big business out for profit over your health?
steve, my wife and I are currently in that particular arena these days here in south-central New Mexico. We're catching up on getting trips ta the doctor and dentist done. Haven't had the opportunity in the past 3-4 years because, gulp, we were either not offered med./den. insurance or couldn't afford/didn't want ta pay for what was offered.
The deductible on the med.insurance offered from the Regional Medical Center I work for here is $5,150. We have ta pay for services we accumulate up to that amount. Now our insurance pays for part of the medical services, but we have to pay a big percentage of things up to that point. Our maximum out-of-pocket that we would have ta pay for everything, including hospital trips, is $10,000. That's for my wife and I. She is on my insurance plan. But man, that is a lot of paying yourself for services and ER trips, etc.! We pay a tad over $400 a month for that BC/BS insurance and about $36 a month for our dental insurance, that's before even going to the doc and getting any services accomplished!
But we're using it quite a bit in late 2013-early 2014 because we're getting a bit closer towards retirement age and if we don't take care of our health right now, including our teeth, things might get worse for us shortly. But this nation is in a world of hurt with medical and dental insurance, lack of it, and the ObamaHealth plan. Ouch! The medical insurance companies are beyond playing hardball right now.
And whoa, I didn't know that the downwind draft does apply to the Carlsbad leak. And I wonder how those 13 are going to fare with their health, too. Doesn't sound good for them right now.
Heh, always figured you for a "kid", Iluv. We just got switched and the new company wants to do everything by phone. I hate that, just want to email, but it's not even an option. Idiots. Wish Obamacare would crater and get the middlemen insurance companies completely out of it. But we digress.
Yep. Better than several pokes in our eyes with a sharp stick. Continued digression. Have to keep positive, the Norman Vincent Peale thing really does work. I guarantee it!
You probably want ta steer this back to the UAW, eh?
@gagrice said:
In a now-infamous speech in April 2009, President Obama publicly attacked these investors — who were merely standing up for their contract and property rights — as profiteers, criticizing them for their unwillingness to make the same sacrifices as other investors (but not, of course, UAW members, who received a windfall). In response to this public browbeating from the president of the United States, the hedge funds caved and agreed to the terms. In the end, only one group of Chrysler bond holders — the Indiana state teacher and police pension funds — continued to object. Indeed, they objected at every stage of the process, but the Supreme Court declined to hear their case. http://www.nationalaffairs.com/publications/detail/the-auto-bailout-and-the-rule-of-law
Imagine that. He also ridiculed Romney about Russia being a problem for the nearby states. So good at ridicule; so bad at effecting governance.
I'm concerned about the Social Security entitlements total cost into the future. Some want to worry about the public workers pension funding levels, but how much of SS/Medicare are covered for the next 50 years? The Cincinnati City pension fund is underfunded by $862 million. The public voted against a reduction of guaranteed pension and switch to 401k's.
What's the total amount owed in the future for all the SS/Medicare folks. What portion is funded? Not funded?
I'd pay German taxes for German roads and transit, but here, the money would likely be diverted to well-connected pseudo-private sector contractors who build at second world quality (like the ones who resulted in a chip and cracked lens on my car last year) and oversalaried overpensioned consultants and managers who excel in getting nothing done (see most road projects in WA state).
I have no problem with industrial rescues either, when everyone else does it.
@MrShift@Edmunds said:
Taxes? Everybody wants a perfect world and nobody wants to pay for it.
The problem is, of course, is that people like to SEE things happening with their money.
I myself was content to see a resurgent Detroit auto industry propped up by TARP money, but some people wanted that PLUS a profit for the US gov on GM stock sales. Can't blame 'em for thinking that.
@MrShift@Edmunds said:
The author of that article sounds like a conclusion in tortured search of isolated facts to support it--further, the airy dismissal of probability is pretty interesting.
I simply don't find this article worthy of the magazine's usual standard of scholarship.
I did not see anything in the Forbes article pertaining to my point in the article I posted. That is the Federal government illegally choosing one retirement over the other. That is NOT a fair and equitable bankruptcy as mandated by Federal Law. And the fact that the Indiana Teachers Pension had a secured loan that they only got 29 cents on the dollar and the UAW was unsecured and got 40 Cents on the Dollar. Yes the SC chose not to hear the case of the Teacher's pension getting screwed in the bankruptcy. That is just more of the same illegal crap going on in America these days. We have an Attorney general that only upholds the laws he likes. Will be interesting to see if the NLRB makes up their own laws in regard to the VW rejection of the UAW?
@gagrice said: And the fact that the Indiana Teachers Pension had a secured loan that they only got 29 cents on the dollar and the UAW was unsecured and got 40 Cents on the Dollar.
When I complained about the favoritism shown to the UAW in treatment by this administration about the GM bonds, I was treated as though I was complaining because I had held bonds. But my wife's pension fund had held various GM paper and my investments had GM scattered throughout. So all of us lost so that the UAW could profit from their effort to elect the current guy.
I find myself feeling the UAW gets a bad rap when some things are brought up and I am against them in re others. It's the other union that lost out: the IBEW which assembled trucks at the GM Moraine plant here which was closed so the UAW could be favored. It's the many Delphi orphans who lost out on their white collar retirement plans--can't feel as sorry for them since they were well paid while working, but that's another Edmunds topic to take up.
Apparently the law has disagreed with you. That's y we call it "the law"--whatever it ends up deciding, is the "law" of the land. Lots of people don't like what the law finally decides.
America's problems are so far beyond the economic, that shifts in pensions or taxes is not going to change them.
My advice to the UAW is the same advice I give to NATO----"don't poke the bear with a sharp stick".
@MrShift@Edmunds said:
Apparently the law has disagreed with you. That's y we call it "the law"--whatever it ends up deciding, is the "law" of the land. Lots of people don't like what the law finally decides.
My advice to the UAW is the same advice I give to NATO----"don't poke the bear with a sharp stick".
I might add, he who shares the gold with those that enforce the laws, find the law on their side.
Very often true. One does not go to the law for justice. One goes to outmaneuver the other side. Rich unions fighting rich corporations just level the playing field.
"In 2008, when the "Detroit Three" auto makers came to Congress looking for financial assistance, I became deeply involved in negotiations, trying to protect taxpayers before any federal funds were expended. During those intense talks, it became quickly apparent through direct negotiations with the UAW's top leadership that its main interest was its own survival. The employees they represent and their affiliated companies were way down the list."
Corker is spot on. The UAW had the best shot they will get in the South with the many foreign manufacturers. If truth ever gets out it is purely a case of VW in Germany pandering to their Union leaders. From the contracts the UAW signed with the D3 who would want to be part of that two tier mess? Why didn't the UAW offer concessions back in the 1990s when the D3 was moving factories to Mexico? They squeezed the life out of the D3 then whine when there are not any jobs left here. How people can blame the politicians for saying their piece is beyond reason. That is self preservation.
Sure, why pay workers liberally when you can find desperate ones to work cheaper? After all, a man's livelihood is just another market commodity to be bartered, right? Now you know why James Madison wanted to prohibit massive inequalities in wealth in a democracy.
Teamsters give more to Obama than UAW, will he bail out their ailing Pension funds?
The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, the government agency that protects pensions, insures more than 10 million Americans in multiemployer pension plans. Millions of participants in multiemployer plans have already received cryptic notices that their plans are underfunded and will likely be taken over by the PBGC within three to five years.
Obama can't "spend" a nickel, and he is not Putin, he cannot direct congress to vote his way. Obviously, both the GOP and Dems have been eager these last few decades to "vote for votes" regardless of what happens to your money. I think more Americans should actually meet and talk to people in Congress--it might shock you how little they actually know about how what they are doing.
@MrShift@Edmunds said:
Obama can't "spend" a nickel, and he is not Putin, he cannot direct congress to vote his way. Obviously, both the GOP and Dems have been eager these last few decades to "vote for votes" regardless of what happens to your money. I think more Americans should actually meet and talk to people in Congress--it might shock you how little they actually know about how what they are doing.
Actually the President can spend a very large amount of money. Once it is allocated to the various entities he has a lot of control over the expenditures. Much of the Green Agenda money was handed out by his people in the DOE. The TARP money was handed out by the appointee of the President's. I don't think the President has a pot he can dip into for the ailing pension plans. My point was there are a lot of pension plans in very bad condition both public and private. Bailing out the UAW pensions did NOTHING to keep the automakers from going bankrupt. When US Steel went belly up along with the airlines there was no golden parachute given to the pension plans by the tax payers. Which to me makes them an obvious target of the tax payers. The UAW owes US $27 billion we will NEVER see. It only benefitted the UAW retirees.
I do agree that most politicians soon forget where they came from. They only worry about those that gave them large amounts to get elected. And are a clueless waste of Oxygen.
Nope. The POTUS cannot spend a dime unless it has been appropriated by Congress. Some of these appropriations are block grants for discretionary spending, which expenditures must be accounted for.
However, the President is required by the Constitution to pay the country's debts, even if Congress decides to not pay them.
@MrShift@Edmunds said:
Nope. The POTUS cannot spend a dime unless it has been appropriated by Congress. Some of these appropriations are block grants for discretionary spending, which expenditures must be accounted for.
However, the President is required by the Constitution to pay the country's debts, even if Congress decides to not pay them.
I think you are trying to sidestep the issue with double talk. Here is testimony given last year to Congress. It ain't over by any stretch of the imagination. We the tax payers got screwed and hopefully someone will force the UAW to return our money. We could start with the $6 billion in the UAW Strike Fund. They won't need that money.
The government bailout of General Motors (GM) and Chrysler between 2008 and 2009 will cost taxpayers between $17 and $20 billion. The entirety of these losses occurred because the Administration gave the United Auto Workers (UAW) special treatment. The UAW recovered far more in the bankruptcy than it had a legal right to:
Legally, the UAW’s claims had the same status as those of other unsecured creditors, but the UAW recovered a much greater proportion of the debts that General Motors and Chrysler owed the union.
Bankruptcy typically brings uncompetitive wages down to competitive levels. However, existing UAW members did not take pay cuts at General Motors.
The restructured General Motors used taxpayer funds to “top up” the pensions of unionized retirees at Delphi, its bankrupt former parts subsidiary. New GM had no legal obligation to do so and nonunion employees did not receive similar benefits.
These subsidies to UAW compensation cost taxpayers $30.0 billion—more than the government spends each year on foreign aid or on extended unemployment insurance benefits. They account for the entire net taxpayer losses in the bailout.
UAW members at General Motors and Chrysler are among the most highly paid workers in America. High salaries are good, but they must be earned. The taxpayer losses came from the special treatment that President Obama bestowed on the UAW. The auto bailout was actually a UAW bailout.
Comments
It's way more complex than "unions"---way more. If you read her article closely, you see the problem:
"The primary reasons for bankruptcy were due to plummeting sales and property tax revenue – we lost 20 percent of our general fund in 18 months"
What's true for Vallejo holds true for the Federal government and for your home town as well.
The second aspect of this complexity is that public service unions justifiably ask: "Why do WE have to take the hit? Why don't all the fat cats take the hit? Why is "entrepreneurship" a sacrament and "pension" a sin?
Why, if you sit behind a desk at the county clerk's office, you are a parasitic leech, but if you sit behind a big walnut desk at GM or Ford you are a brilliant hard-working "executive"?
Yeah, WHY?
Are we SURE this is how we want to save money? Are we SURE we want our cars built by people with no job security and no "up" in their job skills?
What's true for Vallejo holds true for the Federal government and for your home town as well.
The second aspect of this complexity is that public service unions justifiably ask: "Why do WE have to take the hit? Why don't all the fat cats take the hit? Why is "entrepreneurship" a sacrament and "pension" a sin?
Why, if you sit behind a desk at the county clerk's office, you are a parasitic leech, but if you sit behind a big walnut desk at GM or Ford you are a brilliant hard-working "executive"?
I repeat myself. I have no problem with UAW workers making as much money as the market will allow. That is somewhat controlled by the market place. My point is Trade Unions like my Teamsters and UAW are thrown into the same basket as the Public employee Unions. Which is what the tax payers see in their faces on a daily basis. Public servants making WAY MORE in most cases than the average tax payer. Then they retire at a young age with a HUGE pension that is on the backs of those same tax payers.
Ah, so you perceive an injustice in that?
Cincinnati for one, are low on funding because the city kept putting off the required paying the funds in--because it was more fund to spend the money on something else rather than fund the pensions of the workers. Now they owe huge amounts to the pension fund, and they are hoping to put in some money and have the state taxpayers take over the deficit in the pension fund by absorbing the workers into a state pension fund. That's the taxpayers subsidizing the city even more than the two huge stadiums for the Reds and Bengals we helped pay for.
I don't know how Ohio pensions are compared to CA. I would imagine they are more in line with the general public. CA public employees have the cream of the crop jobs in the state outside the limo Liberal Dot.commers in the San Francisco area. When there are cities going bankrupt and the public employees do not want to share in the pain, it hurts all of US. When you have 1000s of public employees retiring at a very young age with huge pensions someone has to pay those. I don't want to be one of those people. Funding is also based on average life expectancies which are going up very fast for seniors. The pensions do not get cut off at 74.5 years of age.
http://www.ocregister.com/taxdollars/city-515888-100k-club.html
Absolutely!
Okay...an injustice to whom exactly? (not interrogating you--just really interested).
"Overall bankrupt municipalities remain extremely rare. A Governing analysis estimated only one of every 1,668 eligible general-purpose local governments (0.06 percent) filed for bankruptcy protection over the past five years. Excluding filings later dismissed, only one of every 2,710 eligible localities filed since 2008." (governing.com)
That's 0.06%. Much ado about not much, but it makes for juicy headlines I suppose. Looks like it's Nebraska that needs to get its [expletive deleted] together. (journalstar.com)
In union news, there isn't anything new. The UAW appeals process is in the works and VW is mum on a new SUV line.
The tax payers that are not getting fairly represented. Legislators, council people, and Congress are all being bought by the highest bidders. Which in many cases are the Unions. Especially public employee unions like NEA and SEIU. It feeds on itself like cancer and next thing you know the city is in debt and cannot pay the bills.
I realize cities like Vallejo lost a lot of money when they forced the Navy out. Who's fault was that? I lived in a quonset hut there in 1952 while my stepdad was getting discharged from the Navy. Seemed like a busy place then.
"Then they retire at a young age with a HUGE pension that is on the backs of those same tax payers."
Exactly. That's probably the grandest waste out of all of it, even more than any other organized benefits that don't exist in the rest of the working world. In for 25-out with 85 and similar idiotic schemes simply shouldn't exist, when they are only available to a few, while the rest pay for it. Pensions shouldn't be subsidized by taxpayers, many of whom will have a far more difficult time in retirement than those they aid. You receive based on what you paid.
Until it is available to the working world in general, it shouldn't be available to only one group, one that usually already has work rules (tenure-based promotion and stability) that most private sector workers couldn't dream of.
But I thought carving out a cushy little niche for yourself was admirable in this country--why do we feel okay about the entrepreneur who makes a bundle and "works hard" but somehow spending 20+ years in some dusty municipal office is thought of as a lark? Don't we all look for the best deals, the house with the best lot site, the best schools for our kids?
Why aren't these "injustices"? Our gain is certainly someone else's loss--we just moved faster, or were smarter. It's not like your local fireman stole, bribed, cheated and lied his way in. And what kept you from becoming a fireman?
Some people don't like having flaming roofs fall in on them or don't want to wind up in hospital four plus times over their career, like my Boise neighbor. I think his longest stay was 3 weeks while they patched up his back from a work injury.
The job is PUBLIC SERVANT. Yes they are entitled to a living wage. Using their influence via the Unions should not give them an unfair advantage at carving that niche over the people paying their wages and benefits. They should be held to the median income for the area. If they don't like the pay as a fireman in Vallejo move to San Francisco where everyone is a Billionaire and can afford $200k per year firemen. I see public employee unions more like the armies of Alexander the Great, going into towns raping and pillaging. At least that is how I feel every Spring when I start putting all my taxes together. I also don't see much for the money spent.
The state is screwing over the more affluent areas with their school money. Could be another reason the Silicon Valley bunch want their own state. This is the reason we just had to cut our teacher's pay.
In the past five years the district has used reserve to funds, but these will run out by 2015. The need for the bond stems from a loss of state funding. In the past schools were funded based on the number of students.
Then last year Governor Jerry Brown and state legislature crafted the Local School Funding formula (LSFF) that gives schools with English language learners and economically disadvantage students more money. “LSFF has changed the way we operate here in Coronado, perhaps forever,” Felix said.
http://www.ecoronado.com/profiles/blogs/school-district-tackles-a-serious-012520141756
If we're going to use that red herring, what amount of pension debt is created by firemen? Probably a fraction compared to LEOs and paper pushers.
Why answer questions with questions? Why should one subset received a subsidized unearned retirement in perpetuity on the backs of the public at large? Why aren't such schemes available to everyone?
But such schemes ARE available to everyone--all you have to do is want that kind of job. As for the term "servant"--well, all politicians are public servants in theory but they make good salaries, have good bennies, and are, by and large, not nearly as smart as your fireman--in fact, you can be shockingly stupid and rise quite high in public office. And they VOTE on these budgets.
I think the ire of the public is quite misdirected when it comes to unions.
that's easy. They are the best fund-raisers. Colleges are now a business....the students are the clients, and the classes are the product. If the students don't like the product, they take their tuition elsewhere. So the top tier at colleges have to be charismatic, and very good salesmen. They don't even have to be smart. The smart ones, the professors, are service providers, and they try not to offend the customers with an "F" grade for anything, ever.
If that were the case they should hire Televangelists. Many of them are proven fund raisers. I say it is political paybacks. Napolitano will not have to teach a class and I cannot imagine anyone picking a school because she is top dog. Reich, Chu, Condi Rice may have some $ draw. It just makes going to college more expensive. We are a disgrace when it comes to the cost of higher education and it is because of over paid public servants.
Round and round we go, convincing nobody, that's the name of the show.
Meanwhile, maybe someone can pop in here with something related to the UAW.
Oh Bob down in Atlanta. Are you there Bob? Help!
Bob is probably partying after his neighbor to the North gave the carpet baggers the boot.
That's a cop out, get real. Not everyone can even get close those jobs - there aren't nearly enough to go around, and much of it doesn't seem to be merit based - seems to stay in the family, especially in smaller towns.
Unions aren't the issue on this black hole of taxpayer expenses subject, as the pensions exist in large volumes outside of unions, but not outside of the public sector. Why should this sector be entitled to lifetime pensions, when virtually nobody else has such an entitlement in modern times? Why can't I get such a guaranteed return on my retirement investments? I could justify such perks for those who really put something on the line - but that's a small minority of those who retire at 60 or before and live much more comfortably than most, while not worrying, and not actually having funded the real value of their benefits.
One place the UAW won't succeed - Jawjuh. I don't think they'd even try. Those TN wages would buy even more in much of GA, probably no need to even try.
If you see a mosquito with numbers on it in Georgia, that's a Cessna.
Just read this long breakdown of the auto bailout. And how the UAW really made out like bandits. Speaking of politicians getting involved in such matters it is quite clear Obama was not adverse to pushing his own illegal agenda. As well as Bush at the beginning. So the tax payers fix the UAW pension fund and screw the Indiana teachers and firemen's fund.
Of the two proceedings, Chrysler's was clearly the more egregious. In the years leading up to the economic crisis, Chrysler had been unable to acquire routine financing and so had been forced to turn to so-called secured debt in order to fund its operations. Secured debt takes first priority in payment; it is also typically preserved during bankruptcy under what is referred to as the "absolute priority" rule — since the lender of secured debt offers a loan to a troubled borrower only because he is guaranteed first repayment when the loan is up. In the Chrysler case, however, creditors who held the company's secured bonds were steamrolled into accepting 29 cents on the dollar for their loans. Meanwhile, the underfunded pension plans of the United Auto Workers — unsecured creditors, but possessed of better political connections — received more than 40 cents on the dollar.
In a now-infamous speech in April 2009, President Obama publicly attacked these investors — who were merely standing up for their contract and property rights — as profiteers, criticizing them for their unwillingness to make the same sacrifices as other investors (but not, of course, UAW members, who received a windfall). In response to this public browbeating from the president of the United States, the hedge funds caved and agreed to the terms. In the end, only one group of Chrysler bond holders — the Indiana state teacher and police pension funds — continued to object. Indeed, they objected at every stage of the process, but the Supreme Court declined to hear their case.
http://www.nationalaffairs.com/publications/detail/the-auto-bailout-and-the-rule-of-law
The author of that article sounds like a conclusion in tortured search of isolated facts to support it--further, the airy dismissal of probability is pretty interesting.
(quote, in response to the idea that without a bailout, GM and Chrysler would have gone bankrupt and been dismantled).....
"But this nightmare scenario was never likely to happen."
Really? Did his crystal ball tell him that?
And THEN he says:
"It is possible that Chrysler would have then faced liquidation "
Whoa?? I thought this couldn't happen?
And THEN he says:
"General Motors, however, would almost certainly have been re-organized. In all likelihood, this re-organization would have produced a company more competitive than the one that emerged from the bailout process."
More competitive than as competitive as it is now? Like....10% more competitive, or ....?
and THEN he says:
"in truth, however, the use of TARP funds to bail out GM and Chrysler most likely violated the law. "
Even though the Supreme Court held the challenge moot.
I simply don't find this article worthy of the magazine's usual standard of scholarship.
Here's a much more interesting point of view from FORBES, in my opinion:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/michelinemaynard/2014/02/17/by-helping-detroit-did-the-uaw-lose-its-future/
Just being in a state like California would be taxing. From the actual taxes, that is. Yikes. What shifty said makes a lot of sense, though, because this is the land of the free, right? Free ta do the Elon Musk thing and make the best all-electric car and make a crunch-load of money from it. Or a rocket ship that will take passengers to Mars (or whatever other thing he is actively working on).
Now, from gagrice's view a bit more, why should these "public servant" people make as much as they do (in some public groups) and why should they get a bigger pension payment than it seems the average American wage-earner makes while they work their active job? Oh, I know. They can because they belong to the UAW...I mean their local public-service union.
2021 Kia Soul LX 6-speed stick
@iluvmysephia1, I wonder if the WIPP mess over in Carlsbad is helping the Nuclear Professionals Union of America get more members.
You might very well be right, stever. I haven't taken much time ta click on that story, even though Carlsbad is only about 175 miles SE of us here in Alamo. Sounds potentially very scary, at least it's not a Hanford-type disaster where downdrifting winds are involved, right?
2021 Kia Soul LX 6-speed stick
Taxes? Everybody wants a perfect world and nobody wants to pay for it.
The problem is, of course, is that people like to SEE things happening with their money.
I myself was content to see a resurgent Detroit auto industry propped up by TARP money, but some people wanted that PLUS a profit for the US gov on GM stock sales. Can't blame 'em for thinking that.
The winds are heading for the panhandle of Texas so you should be "safe". Just funny how stuff that's never supposed to happen keeps happening all too frequently. There's only 13 workers exposed to plutonium and americium that's been reported.
But what are you going to do in the face of big corp or big business out for profit over your health?
Oh yeah, unite in a union.
steve, my wife and I are currently in that particular arena these days here in south-central New Mexico. We're catching up on getting trips ta the doctor and dentist done. Haven't had the opportunity in the past 3-4 years because, gulp, we were either not offered med./den. insurance or couldn't afford/didn't want ta pay for what was offered.
The deductible on the med.insurance offered from the Regional Medical Center I work for here is $5,150. We have ta pay for services we accumulate up to that amount. Now our insurance pays for part of the medical services, but we have to pay a big percentage of things up to that point. Our maximum out-of-pocket that we would have ta pay for everything, including hospital trips, is $10,000. That's for my wife and I. She is on my insurance plan. But man, that is a lot of paying yourself for services and ER trips, etc.! We pay a tad over $400 a month for that BC/BS insurance and about $36 a month for our dental insurance, that's before even going to the doc and getting any services accomplished!
But we're using it quite a bit in late 2013-early 2014 because we're getting a bit closer towards retirement age and if we don't take care of our health right now, including our teeth, things might get worse for us shortly. But this nation is in a world of hurt with medical and dental insurance, lack of it, and the ObamaHealth plan. Ouch! The medical insurance companies are beyond playing hardball right now.
And whoa, I didn't know that the downwind draft does apply to the Carlsbad leak. And I wonder how those 13 are going to fare with their health, too. Doesn't sound good for them right now.
2021 Kia Soul LX 6-speed stick
Heh, always figured you for a "kid", Iluv. We just got switched and the new company wants to do everything by phone. I hate that, just want to email, but it's not even an option. Idiots. Wish Obamacare would crater and get the middlemen insurance companies completely out of it. But we digress.
Yep. Better than several pokes in our eyes with a sharp stick. Continued digression. Have to keep positive, the Norman Vincent Peale thing really does work. I guarantee it!
You probably want ta steer this back to the UAW, eh?
2021 Kia Soul LX 6-speed stick
Imagine that. He also ridiculed Romney about Russia being a problem for the nearby states. So good at ridicule; so bad at effecting governance.
I'm concerned about the Social Security entitlements total cost into the future. Some want to worry about the public workers pension funding levels, but how much of SS/Medicare are covered for the next 50 years? The Cincinnati City pension fund is underfunded by $862 million. The public voted against a reduction of guaranteed pension and switch to 401k's.
What's the total amount owed in the future for all the SS/Medicare folks. What portion is funded? Not funded?
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
We try.
I'd pay German taxes for German roads and transit, but here, the money would likely be diverted to well-connected pseudo-private sector contractors who build at second world quality (like the ones who resulted in a chip and cracked lens on my car last year) and oversalaried overpensioned consultants and managers who excel in getting nothing done (see most road projects in WA state).
I have no problem with industrial rescues either, when everyone else does it.
I did not see anything in the Forbes article pertaining to my point in the article I posted. That is the Federal government illegally choosing one retirement over the other. That is NOT a fair and equitable bankruptcy as mandated by Federal Law. And the fact that the Indiana Teachers Pension had a secured loan that they only got 29 cents on the dollar and the UAW was unsecured and got 40 Cents on the Dollar. Yes the SC chose not to hear the case of the Teacher's pension getting screwed in the bankruptcy. That is just more of the same illegal crap going on in America these days. We have an Attorney general that only upholds the laws he likes. Will be interesting to see if the NLRB makes up their own laws in regard to the VW rejection of the UAW?
When I complained about the favoritism shown to the UAW in treatment by this administration about the GM bonds, I was treated as though I was complaining because I had held bonds. But my wife's pension fund had held various GM paper and my investments had GM scattered throughout. So all of us lost so that the UAW could profit from their effort to elect the current guy.
I find myself feeling the UAW gets a bad rap when some things are brought up and I am against them in re others. It's the other union that lost out: the IBEW which assembled trucks at the GM Moraine plant here which was closed so the UAW could be favored. It's the many Delphi orphans who lost out on their white collar retirement plans--can't feel as sorry for them since they were well paid while working, but that's another Edmunds topic to take up.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
Apparently the law has disagreed with you. That's y we call it "the law"--whatever it ends up deciding, is the "law" of the land. Lots of people don't like what the law finally decides.
America's problems are so far beyond the economic, that shifts in pensions or taxes is not going to change them.
My advice to the UAW is the same advice I give to NATO----"don't poke the bear with a sharp stick".
I might add, he who shares the gold with those that enforce the laws, find the law on their side.
Very often true. One does not go to the law for justice. One goes to outmaneuver the other side. Rich unions fighting rich corporations just level the playing field.
"In 2008, when the "Detroit Three" auto makers came to Congress looking for financial assistance, I became deeply involved in negotiations, trying to protect taxpayers before any federal funds were expended. During those intense talks, it became quickly apparent through direct negotiations with the UAW's top leadership that its main interest was its own survival. The employees they represent and their affiliated companies were way down the list."
Bob Corker: Now the Auto Union Wants to Muzzle Public Officials (Wall St. Journal)
Corker is spot on. The UAW had the best shot they will get in the South with the many foreign manufacturers. If truth ever gets out it is purely a case of VW in Germany pandering to their Union leaders. From the contracts the UAW signed with the D3 who would want to be part of that two tier mess? Why didn't the UAW offer concessions back in the 1990s when the D3 was moving factories to Mexico? They squeezed the life out of the D3 then whine when there are not any jobs left here. How people can blame the politicians for saying their piece is beyond reason. That is self preservation.
Sure, why pay workers liberally when you can find desperate ones to work cheaper? After all, a man's livelihood is just another market commodity to be bartered, right? Now you know why James Madison wanted to prohibit massive inequalities in wealth in a democracy.
Teamsters give more to Obama than UAW, will he bail out their ailing Pension funds?
The Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, the government agency that protects pensions, insures more than 10 million Americans in multiemployer pension plans. Millions of participants in multiemployer plans have already received cryptic notices that their plans are underfunded and will likely be taken over by the PBGC within three to five years.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/edwardsiedle/2013/05/13/teamsters-multiemployer-pensions-on-brink-of-collapse-dol-asked-to-investigate/
Obama can't "spend" a nickel, and he is not Putin, he cannot direct congress to vote his way. Obviously, both the GOP and Dems have been eager these last few decades to "vote for votes" regardless of what happens to your money. I think more Americans should actually meet and talk to people in Congress--it might shock you how little they actually know about how what they are doing.
Actually the President can spend a very large amount of money. Once it is allocated to the various entities he has a lot of control over the expenditures. Much of the Green Agenda money was handed out by his people in the DOE. The TARP money was handed out by the appointee of the President's. I don't think the President has a pot he can dip into for the ailing pension plans. My point was there are a lot of pension plans in very bad condition both public and private. Bailing out the UAW pensions did NOTHING to keep the automakers from going bankrupt. When US Steel went belly up along with the airlines there was no golden parachute given to the pension plans by the tax payers. Which to me makes them an obvious target of the tax payers. The UAW owes US $27 billion we will NEVER see. It only benefitted the UAW retirees.
I do agree that most politicians soon forget where they came from. They only worry about those that gave them large amounts to get elected. And are a clueless waste of Oxygen.
Oligocracy, think about it.
Nope. The POTUS cannot spend a dime unless it has been appropriated by Congress. Some of these appropriations are block grants for discretionary spending, which expenditures must be accounted for.
However, the President is required by the Constitution to pay the country's debts, even if Congress decides to not pay them.
@berry, I agree that the vote would have come down the same way if the "outside" influences had stayed away.
That said, the electioneering and billboards helped pump up the Chattanooga economy for a few weeks.
I think you are trying to sidestep the issue with double talk. Here is testimony given last year to Congress. It ain't over by any stretch of the imagination. We the tax payers got screwed and hopefully someone will force the UAW to return our money. We could start with the $6 billion in the UAW Strike Fund. They won't need that money.
The government bailout of General Motors (GM) and Chrysler between 2008 and 2009 will cost taxpayers between $17 and $20 billion. The entirety of these losses occurred because the Administration gave the United Auto Workers (UAW) special treatment. The UAW recovered far more in the bankruptcy than it had a legal right to:
Legally, the UAW’s claims had the same status as those of other unsecured creditors, but the UAW recovered a much greater proportion of the debts that General Motors and Chrysler owed the union.
Bankruptcy typically brings uncompetitive wages down to competitive levels. However, existing UAW members did not take pay cuts at General Motors.
The restructured General Motors used taxpayer funds to “top up” the pensions of unionized retirees at Delphi, its bankrupt former parts subsidiary. New GM had no legal obligation to do so and nonunion employees did not receive similar benefits.
These subsidies to UAW compensation cost taxpayers $30.0 billion—more than the government spends each year on foreign aid or on extended unemployment insurance benefits. They account for the entire net taxpayer losses in the bailout.
UAW members at General Motors and Chrysler are among the most highly paid workers in America. High salaries are good, but they must be earned. The taxpayer losses came from the special treatment that President Obama bestowed on the UAW. The auto bailout was actually a UAW bailout.
http://www.heritage.org/research/testimony/2013/08/auto-bailout-or-uaw-bailout-taxpayer-losses-came-from-subsidizing-union-compensation