Posted on 03/28/2015 7:22:38 AM PDT by Citizen Zed
Suckers beware is an oversimplification.
Any time you rely on a future promise to get paid, you have to evaluate WHO is making the promise, especially whether or not they have the means to deliver.
Public employee “unions” normally bargain with executive branch officials with limited tenure. The money to pay the “contracts” must be appropriated by legislatures not yet elected.
If those future legislators are not free to cut taxes and reduce spending, then the people who elected them are not sovereign.
“A contract is a contract.”
In my mind, that’s really the heart of many of these municipal pension problems. A contract *is* a contract, but a “sweetheart deal” is a sweetheart deal even when it is a contract.
In Illinois, for decades democrat politicians have bought the votes of teachers with retirement plans that are totally unrealistic financially. Yes they are contracts, but those contracts were written for the benefit of a political group (the teachers unions) by those who benefited from the support of that political group - the democrat office holders - in the name of those who were actually on the hook for those costs (the rest of the taxpayers and their descendants).
Legally, it’s a deal. Ethically, it’s a swindle. And you can stay in Illinois to see how that sort of legal swindle plays out in the extreme: people may remember the Illinois retiree who was getting $30k/year as a retired legislative assistant; $31 k/year as a retired teachers union rep, and wanted $36k/year more as a retired teacher - the latter based on *one day’s* service as a sub.
Legally it appears that the union worked into a contract terms that made the latter claim legitimate. Ethically, it doesn’t take Thomas Aquinas to figure out the guy is gaming the system. So in a state that’s trying it’s best to turn into Detroit, how does one balance strict legality, fiscal reality, and simple fairness?
I don’t pretend to know, but I do expect it all to come to a head, and soon. And the result will not be pretty.
NE Ohio
NJ is notorious for this; completely unsustainable. If we were to fully fund our pension obligations, masses of current public employees would be on the street. That’s probably what should happen anyway; the state has reduced the amounts fed into the welfare reservations, and they’ve been laying off a lot of employees.
NE Ohio
Between Chicago and NYC.
Pa is loaded with mobs too
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=emVaPqUqNOg
A bird in the hand is better than a poke in the eye with a blunt stick...
You know the game, the Union gains political power and writes in the payoffs.
Obamacare is about the SEIU and sweetheart deals
Anyone recall that within Obamas 1st year in office, over 100 NYC Mafia bosses were rounded up?
That was not justice, That was The Chicago mob taking over the NYC turf.
Good stuff; thanks.
In the end, jobs will stream from these places to others without these mafia arrangements (and more importantly, the debts they’ve imposed).
Never become indebted my friend.
The interest may be to much to pay.
So when I was helping veterans find work at the unemployment office or guarding aircraft at the Air Guard base, I was in the mafia? You learn something new every day. Oh, and the military itself would be defined as “public workers” since they’re part of the government. So I was in the mafia there too? Wow.
I live in NJ; we’re coasting on debt while our bond rating drops...
One of the goals of the Obamunists is to force those prosperous states to fund the shortfalls of the leftwing paradises.
Enjoy the new Detroit where you are drawing pension from. Or will you be one of those that calls in your pensions and splits the community?
The Government in general must be managed, lest they become indifferent and abusive to the people.
These are corporate pensions and are just a small stipend.
When I hired in they were good pensions, now they are just a pittance.
What do they expect to happen when they promise more than they can deliver?
Know of some cases myself.
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