Jim

Thanks again for the arm waving response to a straight-forward question. Over and out.

Oveall tax reveunes are down. Pension fund issues are a seperate issue because no matter what the economy was, is, or is going to be - they are under funded. WTF? I'm not hearing any solution that does not involve raising taxes - which has been dismissed (rightly or wrongly) by the public in WA. So provide a Plan B here that involves something that we, in WA, have control over. Anything, really! Or is this just another arm-waving exercise?

Yea, that's what I'm saying. But if you can't admit that changes need to be made to the way promised pensions are funded or that things like automatic, year-in-grade pay increases, share of medical coverage costs, and some wasted overtime need to be reviewed - then there is going to be little conversation with the public on raising taxes.

You make a valid point - and that is why I think it needs to be worked at both ends. Looking at the recent Ferry DOT scandal for instance - when asked about why supervisors were signing off on millions of dollars of un-needed overtime, DOT's head came back with -"...supervisors were not aware that part of their duties were to keep down unnecessary costs." Ok, well that added a lot of confidence to the voters to shovel more cash into the system. On the other hand - voters are very short-sighted these days and lacking in confidence for long-term progrmas. Likely changes in the first problem would help this second one.

While I think the pension issue needs fixing, I have sympathy for the state because of the boneheaded voters who don't want to be taxed to invest in education, technology, or infrastructure. Anytime a state runs a surplus the neocons start banging on the door claiming they are overtaxed and demanding a refund. Take WA where the voters have continually voted for less taxes, even very focused ones on nonessentials such as candy and soda. You are stuck trying to patch together some forward looking programs with glue and popcicle sticks.

I suppose this means there is no plan B.

Well. I'll try and explain this one last time regarding pensions. If you are only puting in 50 cents on the dollar of future obligations during the good times(promised pensions) it doesn't matter what your tax revenues are doing. You are still going to have a day of reckoning. Newsflash - it's here. Bubbles burst - you cut back. Tapping out the credit card - cut back. You do this at home, likely you are more conservative and don't push the envelope as the state and local governments have. Raise tax revenue? Not happening in WA and other jurisdictions. What then is plan B?

Thanks for the article. I worked with Bill for a few years and would have to say he shared the frustration of some of these changes but was out-voted. Eventually he left the Board while a few others seem to be permanant fixtures. I think things veered off the co-op course when they decided to go big retail. That decision inherently involves more bottom-line decisions. How many large co-ops are out there that actually function as one. PCC isn't exactly in the same league as REI. I've heard decent things about Costco, how they treat their employees, etc., but they are not run by their members either.

Easterlies often keep the snow level lower at the passes.

Well this guy, and you, obviously didn't watch or pay attention to the 60 Minutes segment. The backbone of the reporting was on unfunded pensions. The increasing urgency of the ponzi scheme of state and local pensions was not created by the current financial crisis. But the veil of illusion was pulled out because of it. No matter what the tax revenues were, or are, these programs are not sustainable. Really, please do the math.

I hear similar views from folks I consider pretty liberal and conservative. There is a need to more responsibly manage public money. There's quite a number of items that government can supply better and more fairly (yes, subjective) than the private industry. I'm even ok with public service jobs paying a little more, having more security, and limiting to a 40 hr week. But some of the other perks - non-funded pensions, minimal contribution to health plans, and crazy overtime pay - well that is not just equitable. But, and this is where the left does have a justified beef, the uber-rich in the country are not being put on similar scrutiny. Exhibit A is the recent tax "compromise" giving another huge tax break to the rich and deepening our debt hole. That said - pointing fingers to the federal issues and not working on sustainable practices on the state and local level does not endear trust in the voters. Including me.

There is no reason to think that layoffs and wage and benefit cuts would necessarily lead to the continuation, much less the expansion, of social services. This is particularly so since the most vocal advocates for busting public sector unions are also opposed to the public provision of social services. At least Fairweather has the intellectual honesty not to go here. This answer is just as ignorant of the realties as FW's, however. Look at the ferry link posted by JayB. No matter what your political stripe that kinda of pay, $500k above base pay over 10 years, that doesn't need changing? I agree that there is a need for a more federal and state progressive tax sturcture, but the argument you provide above is, well, a non-starter. What I keep hearing is this "Everything else is tipped to the rich folks so there is no need to pay attention to financial responsibility ont the state or local level". Huh?

i would argue that we all contribute to ceo pay packages, as surely as we contribute to the terribly overpaid ticket taker's pay package, through things like cost of services, inflationary pressures, lack of equitable taxation etc etc and many other externalities (ie percentaqge of income spent on necessities). Not a good analogy. I don't use Verizon. I have no choice in paying taxes.

I would generally agree with this - yes, we're in a pickle. But because the skills necessary to make, say $75k or more a year have shifted to a greater need for advanced education and technology skills, we should prop up those who don't have those skills with jobs they could never get in the public sector; with tax money? That doesn't make sense. Yes invest more in education, have a more progressive tax structure, trim the military budget in half. But - that doesn't aleviate state level politicians from making sustainable economic decisions that needed to happen years ago when the good times veiled the problems. It's here now and we have to deal.

Oh dear. Irony meter clogged with eggnog.

Well, seems WA tried to come up with some tax programs, some that I voted for - but these were voted down. So now what? What, specifically is your solution for dealing with unfunded obligations for pensions? Reasonable measures to make the state more solvent will allow for a greater delivery of social and environmental programs, for instance. What do you think the state is going to do, exactly, to tax the CEO of Verizon? That is a federal tax issues - yep, Congress should not have given more tax breaks to the uber-rich, they have had more than enough over the past two decades. Sustainable practices on the state end is something different. How does responsible economics on the state site translate into opression in your view?

While I think it's a generous pay scale, if you read my post I didn't say anything about reducing it, but dealing with what is clearly unsustainable policies - topped by unfunded pesions. So what would be your solution? Ignore it as has been done for the past 20 years? With or without a financial crisis this was eventually going to be a problem - and it will, and is affecting delivery of social services and environmental programs. Raise taxes? Good luck on that one in WA. Just give me a solution here on how you would tackle the unfunded obligations?

While I agree that no one is worth what the CEO of Verizon gets - he isn't getting paid with my tax dollars.

$50k base salary for taking tickets and making change - really - you could only get that in the public sector. But I would not want to have a race to the bottom, there are reasonable changes that could be made to public sector contracts: increase the amount of contribution to health care, get rid of pensions for current employees and go to 401ks, lay off some staff already. The pensions are especialy unsustainable - the sooner we deal with it the better. There's likely some other places - a friend who works at UW in a similar job as mine get 100% match on his 401k - I mean, really? funded by taxpayers. The recent spate of cuts by the state are just unavoidable - and rather than do something such as eliminate automatic year-in-grade step increases (not COLA) the govenor decided to go witht he plan to reduce employee hours by 3 hrs a week. Just for this year. This is just pushing out the invitable changes a bit more.

Ascarani, Apalobamba, Bolivia Chaupi Orco valley, Apalobamba, Bolivia Porcupine Rim, Moab, UT

....once!

Whew! I'm glad we cleared that up because your whole argument concerning gays in the military was hanging by a thread there.

No one is defending subsidies and tarriffs here - and I've made clear before the need to deal with unsustainable policies on the local government scale. The difference, however, is that the local governments are beginning to make some steps towards structural change - while the party continues in the financial gaming system - including a lack of transparency, any meaningful oversight, or God forbid - actual penalties for those at the head of the fraud - rating agencies, AIG, and the NINJA loan backers. As usual no pain in the upper brackets, no lessons to be learned. Steady as she goes mate.

This is not some aberration of the market system, just the latest manifestation. Private industry has a strong background in bailouts: http://www.propublica.org/special/government-bailouts There will be another emerging trend soon enough where the Masters of the Universe figure out a way to game the system, make a ton of cash, and then ask for public money. All the while the Wall Street Journal will be full of Op-Eds on how this doesn't represent the true market system. My guess is that the next trend will make use of Ouija Boards.

I spoke to my friend's son recently, who was on leave with the Navy. It was interesting to get his view of things. He spend the last year on ships with hundreds of Marines in the Gulf. His take was that basically nobody cares except the politicians and the upper brass who need to be politically sensitive. The guys on the ships have had it figured out for decades. The saying is "Queer on the pier but no one is gay when we're underway" - which of course they all just laugh at. And the marines were lining up to go see "Tina" - a Navy guy who loved to sing Tina Turner songs, as he had a side business keeping the troops in good morale. As always in regard to social change, Congress was behind the curve in public opinion and saw the changes coming.