Crux Posted February 19, 2011 Author Share Posted February 19, 2011 For the past few days, I've noted that the governor of Wisconsin has been lying about his state's financial status, saying there's a budget crisis while passing on to the nation sound bites that say all he's doing now is what he was elected to do: Fixing the state's fiscal crisis. But the lie is obvious to anybody who gets more news than what's relayed via media such as the standard AP News snippets: When he took office, last month, the Republican governor inherited a substantial budget surplus. What happened? [video:youtube] Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lucky Larry Posted February 19, 2011 Share Posted February 19, 2011 fair enough, take 1 min of news and make it into 14 min Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mal_Con Posted February 20, 2011 Share Posted February 20, 2011 Thanks for posting that we expats in the Great White North do not get MSNBC, I bet Keith is really blasting them, oh yeah Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nitrox Posted February 20, 2011 Share Posted February 20, 2011 Maddow is the liberal equivalent of Glen Beck. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tvashtarkatena Posted February 20, 2011 Share Posted February 20, 2011 Keith quit a couple of weeks ago. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nitrox Posted February 20, 2011 Share Posted February 20, 2011 Keith quit a couple of weeks ago. Who? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
murraysovereign Posted February 21, 2011 Share Posted February 21, 2011 ...we expats in the Great White North do not get MSNBC... You don't? How come - is that some sort of restriction imposed on aliens or something? Anyhow, if you want MSNBC, you can have mine - I never use it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pope Posted February 21, 2011 Share Posted February 21, 2011 If wages and working conditions in the public sector become comparatively less attractive than options outside of the public sector, state and local governments won't be able to attract and retain the staff with the skills necessary to deliver public services and they'll have to respond by increasing wages or improving working conditions. It's not like people working in the public sector have been forcibly conscripted and locked in fenced compounds. Presumably the reason they're working in the public sector because the tangible and intangible benefits of doing were more appealing than the alternatives available to them in the private sector. If the tangible and intangible benefits of working for the public sector are no longer satisfactory - they can and should leave. If enough public sector employees do so and the state or municipality can't fill the position at the same wage and benefit level, then the state will have to....increase the wages and benefits until they are sufficient to attract a replacement. Where is the nightmare scenario here? Actually, there's another option, when wages offered together with prevailing working conditions fail to attract qualified candidates. The state can/does hire poorly qualified candidates. Not long ago, a local school district posted three teaching positions for high-school mathematics. Precisely three applied, and three were hired. Each had earned a bachelor’s degree, not one in mathematics. Not one was even minimally qualified according to state standards to teach secondary mathematics. In fact, not one was licensed by the state to teach. Yet they were hired. I guess they had a pulse and a temperature, and via some “emergency” clause, they joined the force, with the understanding they would begin work on certification. One guy made it beyond the first year. Friday at lunch some members of his department explained to him how to solve the equation log(10^x)=3. I agree with the theory….let the free market (the labor market) dictate wages. If only that were the way it worked, I’d probably be making double my salary. Then I could give up my second job, and I probably wouldn’t have to pay a health care premium for my family equal to almost half my mortgage. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
olyclimber Posted February 21, 2011 Share Posted February 21, 2011 Hell they say you might be making log(10^x)=3. your salary! But instead, you're an overpaid communist. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lucky Larry Posted February 21, 2011 Share Posted February 21, 2011 (edited) Wow Pope, I had it wrong. I thought they had stacks of over qualified teachers looking for work. I predict most of the public sector jobs, like the meter readers and teachers, will be outsourced to private companies that will do it for less because they have hungrier slaves working for them. However, i have been told by a public employee that the public bottom line is still smaller then the private bottom line. Reason, private co. like to make a fat profit. Hence, no privatization in some areas yet. Here's what Stalin did. wikipedia Researcher Robert Conquest, meanwhile, has revised his original estimate of up to 30 million victims down to 20 million.[109] In his most recent edition of The Great Terror (2007), Conquest states that while exact numbers may never be known with complete certainty, the various terror campaigns launched by the Soviet government claimed no fewer than 15 million lives.[110] Others maintain that their earlier higher victim total estimates are correct.[111][112] Edited February 21, 2011 by Lucky Larry Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Crux Posted February 21, 2011 Author Share Posted February 21, 2011 "So it’s not about the budget; it’s about the power." Krugman: Wisconsin Power Play Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
prole Posted February 21, 2011 Share Posted February 21, 2011 The excruciating situation of whiny Wisconsin conservative lawmakers whining in whiny Wisconsin accents is unbearable. It could also be tearing a sonic rift in the universal space-time fabric. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JayB Posted February 22, 2011 Share Posted February 22, 2011 If wages and working conditions in the public sector become comparatively less attractive than options outside of the public sector, state and local governments won't be able to attract and retain the staff with the skills necessary to deliver public services and they'll have to respond by increasing wages or improving working conditions. It's not like people working in the public sector have been forcibly conscripted and locked in fenced compounds. Presumably the reason they're working in the public sector because the tangible and intangible benefits of doing were more appealing than the alternatives available to them in the private sector. If the tangible and intangible benefits of working for the public sector are no longer satisfactory - they can and should leave. If enough public sector employees do so and the state or municipality can't fill the position at the same wage and benefit level, then the state will have to....increase the wages and benefits until they are sufficient to attract a replacement. Where is the nightmare scenario here? Actually, there's another option, when wages offered together with prevailing working conditions fail to attract qualified candidates. The state can/does hire poorly qualified candidates. Not long ago, a local school district posted three teaching positions for high-school mathematics. Precisely three applied, and three were hired. Each had earned a bachelor’s degree, not one in mathematics. Not one was even minimally qualified according to state standards to teach secondary mathematics. In fact, not one was licensed by the state to teach. Yet they were hired. I guess they had a pulse and a temperature, and via some “emergency” clause, they joined the force, with the understanding they would begin work on certification. One guy made it beyond the first year. Friday at lunch some members of his department explained to him how to solve the equation log(10^x)=3. I agree with the theory….let the free market (the labor market) dictate wages. If only that were the way it worked, I’d probably be making double my salary. Then I could give up my second job, and I probably wouldn’t have to pay a health care premium for my family equal to almost half my mortgage. Not a problem when seeking to fill a social-studies vacancy, I'd wager. I've always argued that it was ludicrous to pay all teachers the same salary, irrespective of their qualifications. Unfortunately for you, and the students, the teacher's unions have always insisted on paying people with a B.S. in Physics the same as those with a B.A. in Physical Education. I'm glad that there are qualified people like yourself who chose to go into teaching, but am not optimistic that your status as a relative anomaly will be going away any time soon. Not a prayer of that happening until there's massive reform of the entire sector of the kind that the free-market wackos running....Sweden...imposed a few years ago. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
j_b Posted February 22, 2011 Share Posted February 22, 2011 the teachers' union didn't argue for MBAs (or similar) to be paid several times what many PhDs in Physics make, free-marketeers did. In Sweden, anyone who'd argue to take away bargaining rights from employees would be considered to have something in common with Adolf! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lucky Larry Posted February 22, 2011 Share Posted February 22, 2011 (edited) That is sad news JayB; however, I disagree in some respects. I feel the shittiest jobs should be paid more; eg. Care givers, garbage collectors, farm workers should get paid more than politicians and bankers. Why? Because it really is more work: mass,time, distance. Cops should be paid more because they deal with some real nasty people. Fireman, I'm prejudiced, should only be paid while they are actually working, say $35 /hour, no benefits. In fact, level the whole field--no benefits for anyone; hence, no jealousy. People would then be motivated by their passion of work, not dollars, hence, the best people for the position. It's all fucked up anyway. Machines replace people, don't need as many people, surplus of useless people, useless paper pushing busy work jobs, stupid standards of living eg more cars, horses, boats, rv's, electronic crap--where does it end? Well, your just raining on my parade. No, I really don't care anymore(more lies) because there isn't a solution to the pollution. Best wishes. Edited February 22, 2011 by Lucky Larry Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JayB Posted February 22, 2011 Share Posted February 22, 2011 the teachers' union didn't argue for MBAs (or similar) to be paid several times what many PhDs in Physics make, free-marketeers did. In Sweden, anyone who'd argue to take away bargaining rights from employees would be considered to have something in common with Adolf! Arguing that some abstract definition of rank or merit should entitle someone to a pre-determined socio-economic status in society pretty much puts you in the same camp as social conservatives who can't cope with the fact that when people are free to spend their money as they please, pornographers tend to out-earn priests. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
j_b Posted February 22, 2011 Share Posted February 22, 2011 as if the relative wages of corporate management had anything to do with how much they contribute to whatever their company is selling. You are seriously deluded. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
j_b Posted February 22, 2011 Share Posted February 22, 2011 "What Gov. Walker Won’t Tell You by Stanley Kutler There is a kernel of truth in Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker’s claim of a “budget shortfall” of $137 million. But Walker, a Republican, failed to tell the state that less than two weeks into his term as governor, he, with his swollen Republican majorities in the Wisconsin Legislature, pushed through $117 million in tax breaks for business allies of the GOP. There is your crisis. The state Legislature’s Legislative Fiscal Bureau—Wisconsin’s equivalent of the Congressional Budget Office and a refuge for professional expertise and nonpartisanship—warned Walker and the Legislature that the measure would create a budget gap. There is your shortfall—and not one resulting from established public employee benefits. Before the tax giveaways, the fiscal agency predicted a surplus for the state. Now the governor has offered a proposal simple and clear in its intent, and patently dishonest. Walker wants state workers to contribute to their pension fund and is calling for an increase in their payments for medical insurance. Make no mistake: The governor’s “budget repair bill” has little to do with a budget shortfall and everything to do with breaking unions, starting with public employees and then perhaps moving on to others as well. During his run for governor, Walker had substantial financial support from the Koch brothers, billionaire industrialists who have funded various anti-Obama, anti-science, and anti-national government movements. In short, they are opposed to anyone and anything that might diminish their exorbitant profits. And for the Kochs, destroying labor unions is in the top tier of their to-get-rid-of list." What Gov. Walker Won’t Tell You Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
prole Posted February 22, 2011 Share Posted February 22, 2011 Arguing that some abstract definition of rank or merit should entitle someone to a pre-determined socio-economic status in society pretty much puts you in the same camp as social conservatives... Next you'll be arguing against basic human rights. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
prole Posted February 22, 2011 Share Posted February 22, 2011 Arguing that some abstract definition of rank or merit should entitle someone to a pre-determined socio-economic status in society pretty much puts you in the same camp as social conservatives... You're totally right. First and foremost, socio-economic status in society should be predetermined by hereditary birth lottery. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tvashtarkatena Posted February 22, 2011 Share Posted February 22, 2011 Lab rat quality hypothetical 'debate' with no relevance to reality, and, as such, crushingly boring. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nitrox Posted February 22, 2011 Share Posted February 22, 2011 Lab rat quality hypothetical 'debate' with no relevance to reality, and, as such, crushingly boring. Kinda like a Highspeed Rail thread, no? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nitrox Posted February 22, 2011 Share Posted February 22, 2011 [video:youtube] Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hugh Conway Posted February 22, 2011 Share Posted February 22, 2011 the teachers' union didn't argue for MBAs (or similar) to be paid several times what many PhDs in Physics make, free-marketeers did. In Sweden, anyone who'd argue to take away bargaining rights from employees would be considered to have something in common with Adolf! Arguing that some abstract definition of rank or merit should entitle someone to a pre-determined socio-economic status in society pretty much puts you in the same camp as social conservatives who can't cope with the fact that when people are free to spend their money as they please, pornographers tend to out-earn priests. On planet earth here religion is still much bigger business than porn. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
j_b Posted February 22, 2011 Share Posted February 22, 2011 Check out Nitrox carrying water for that neo-fascist O'Keefe and his smear campaign against teacher's union . Is anybody really surprised ... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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