Since public employee unions are the single most powerful interest group, this will get the politicians off the dime.
I read down the thread and found some disappointing responses...many so-called conservatives have bought into the Left's premises...
"Is it the workers’ fault that a budget hasn’t been passed?"
In life, that's irrelevant. Workers in the private sector take pay cuts, get laid off and fired every single day...through no "fault" of their own.
"This is nothing to gloat about..."
This may be the only gloatworthy news this month.
"THOSE should ultimately be shaved off the payroll, but don’t punish everyone..."
They aren't being punished...management hasn't done their job. Happens in the private sector all the time.
"Obviously the employees could not survive on minimum wage and it is not right to make them suffer through no fault of their own. Would you want to be paid minimum wage?"
Totally irrelevant...no one wants to be paid minimum wage in any case...but what they "want" is also irrelevant. It's not just about them.
"No fault of their own..." betrays an entitlement mentality. If private sector workers aren't "entitled" to their jobs and pay, why would public sector employees be?
However, former “high-level” apparatchiks from the civil service are generally unhappy in the world of profit and loss where you have to justify your job by really working to help the enterprise realize said profits...
How true! Most people really have no appreciation of the chasm between public employment and private employment.
In the private sector, the closest approximation to public employees is the UAW.
I like how you think.