{"id":299265,"date":"2010-02-08T19:58:41","date_gmt":"2010-02-09T00:58:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/seattletimes.nwsource.com\/html\/northwestvoices\/2011018936_trimmingthestatesexpenses.html?syndication=rss"},"modified":"2010-02-08T19:58:41","modified_gmt":"2010-02-09T00:58:41","slug":"trimming-the-states-expenses","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/299265","title":{"rendered":"Trimming the state’s expenses"},"content":{"rendered":"

Spread the misery to public-sector jobs too<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Times\u2019 article \u201cState\u2019s expense is hardest to cut\u201d [page one, Feb. 7] says \u201cwages and benefits for teachers and state workers make up 60 percent of the budget.\u201d Negotiations of public employees\u2019 labor contracts have a flaw.<\/p>\n

Private-sector union negotiators face businesses protecting their stockholders\u2019 \u2014 or their own \u2014 financial interests, providing a stiff backbone against union demands. Those negotiating public workers\u2019 labor agreements have no such direct pocketbook reason to resist unions\u2019 demands.<\/p>\n

Instead they have a great desire to meet union demands since they not only receive election-campaign support but also receive votes from union members. There is really nobody looking out for us citizens in such negotiations.<\/p>\n

In these dire times \u2014 with governments facing huge deficits and citizens everywhere facing grim losses \u2014 there is no reason why union workers in public-sector jobs should not share in the ordeal.<\/p>\n

\u2014 Spencer Higley, Edmonds<\/em><\/p>\n

Decrease \u2018manager\u2019 positions<\/strong><\/p>\n

While I agree with The Times that the more than friendly relationship between the public-sector unions and the Democrats who control state government contributes to the current budget problems, I think that you\u2019ve entirely missed another \u2014 equally significant \u2014 factor.<\/p>\n

During my time as an employee of two different state agencies, I witnessed an almost \u201caphid-like\u201d growth in the population of so-called \u201cmanagers\u201d within state government. Each new manager not only added larger payroll costs, but it was also my experience that each addition led to a measurable reduction on the productivity of the agency.<\/p>\n

From the beginning of Gov. Chris Gregoire\u2019s administration to the time I left state employment, the number of levels of management above me nearly doubled. Based on my observations, such choices as deciding to increase taxes or sacrifice our children\u2019s education are false dilemmas. Quality services can be delivered with a reduced budget if the number of nonproductive \u2014 and non-unionized \u2014 \u201cmanagers\u201d are cut back, at least to pre-Gregoire levels.<\/p>\n

\u2014 Mike Farley, DuPont<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Spread the misery to public-sector jobs too The Times\u2019 article \u201cState\u2019s expense is hardest to cut\u201d [page one, Feb. 7] says \u201cwages and benefits for teachers and state workers make up 60 percent of the budget.\u201d Negotiations of public employees\u2019 labor contracts have a flaw. Private-sector union negotiators face businesses protecting their stockholders\u2019 \u2014 or […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2861,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-299265","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/299265","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2861"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=299265"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/299265\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=299265"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=299265"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=299265"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}