Posted on 10/02/2007 10:15:16 AM PDT by AngelesCrestHighway
That’s a very good point. As a ratepayer/customer all I care about is getting the service at a reasonable price; I couldn’t care less what the employees are paid.
What a dump! I could build something better then that when I was in high school ... by myself ... in less than 2 months ...
Time for Jake Gittes to get involved.
Let me add;
http://www.unionfacts.com/states/state.cfm?state=CA&Submit=Go
Government Employee Union Tax: 28.75%
California residents could pay 28.75% less in state income taxes if they weren’t paying for inflated government employee union wages.
Government Employee Unions
Each year, public sector unions cost California residents millions of dollars by driving state budgets well beyond responsible spending.
Government Employees 1,771,336
Percent Unionized 53.8 %
Average Government Employee Salary $ 56,340
Find more info at link;
http://www.unionfacts.com/states/state.cfm?state=CA&Submit=Go
If they don’t pay market price they will end up with bottom-of-the-barrel workforce.
That’s a lot different than paying a BART transit employee with HS degree $130k to sit around the train station while computers run everything in sight.
Maybe they should hire illegal aliens to build and maintain the power lines around LA.
Taking the shocks Americans won’t take (at least not for illegal alien wages).
Salaries are not the real issue. Pensions and pre retirement health care are the real elephants in the room. California and many other states face crises over unfunded liabilities. The unfunded liabilities represent vast reservoirs of deferred compensation. It is not necessary to pay this large amount of deferred compensation to attract a competent workforce. Public employees should get the same deal that pervades the private sector: 401K and social security.
Californians need to support the California Foundation for Fiscal Responsibility. This group will try to get an initiative on the ballot to raise the retirement age for defined benefit pensions.
As absurd as that seems, it may not be too far off the mark in the near future. Recently one of these municipally funded, so-called 'Labor Centers'opened near me. The lefties who were hired to run the place were touting the notion that skilled labor such as plumbers and electricians were available for hire.
Just imagine an electrical or plumbing contractor who would hire an illegal for installation work...
I worked at the Los Angeles DPW as a student engineer in 1971 for $9,000/yr. Looks like they are now making about $37,800.
Local and state governments are slowly strangling the goose that laid the golden egg. Early retirements with lifetime health care and pensions is gonna crumble the system some day. The unfunded liabilities facing todays kids are enormous. Sooner or later the house of cards comes tumbling down.
Pensions by the public sector should be phased out totally with the riders on the gray train joining the rest of us shlubs with 401K type plans.
You have it exactly right. I work for a reletively small municipal electric utility in the Midwest and I can tell you that the market for journeyman electric linemen is extremely tight just about everywhere. On average our folks earn $70,000 per year in wages alone. And the cost of living here is MUCH lower than L.A.
If you want to provide reliable service that’s simply the price you have to pay to get qualified personnel.
You have it exactly right. I work for a reletively small municipal electric utility in the Midwest and I can tell you that the market for journeyman electric linemen is extremely tight just about everywhere. On average our folks earn $70,000 per year in wages alone. And the cost of living here is MUCH lower than L.A.
If you want to provide reliable service that’s simply the price you have to pay to get qualified personnel.
$76,949 average salary. And really that is only the starting point.
Pensions is at least 15% being generous more. And even that is assuming very optimistic return on investment year after year in stocks. But bear markets come quite frequently, and can last more then a decade. Some argue we are in a bear market now, as we are still below 2000 levels in stocks. And assuming good investments made by the fund managers. Which in the market there tends to be winners and losers. Eg.. how much risky mortgage notes are they holding right now?
I personally think pensions will turn out to be more like a 30% extra salary for city workers. So that brings it to over 100k. Then there is the healthcare benefit, not just while they are working but throughout retirement as well. And not just for them,b ut for their family, and their spouse later in life.
So that adds imo 10,000$ a year for the family while working.. And another 10,000$ a year later in life. So say 13,000$ a year right now.
That brings the average compensation to 113,000$ about. Now add in much longer vacation times. Say 5% more of the year they are on vacation. That brings our total to 118,000$. And thats an average, from the secretaries and apprentice trainies to management.
Finally risk adjusted compensation is a factor few think of. In a free market job you might make big money for a few years, then the market changes or your company fails and you make little or nothing for awhile.
I’m sending in my resume!
Check. Some folks don’t realize that public utilities operations are public health and safety enterprises. They are heavily regulated and require a skilled, conscientious and dedicated workforce.
I’m an operations manager for a midsize water/sewer utility on the west coast, I work with these folks everyday. Upper management really does the public and the utility a disservice when they decide to try to low ball on labor.
Believe me, our people ARE our number 1 resource. They have to perform their jobs at a high level of competency, work out in the freezing rain and broiling sun, be available at any time of the day or night AND be tweaked like lab rats by demanding regulatory bureaucrats.
If the knuckleheads do that they’ll get exactly what they pay for...and they’ll deserve every bit of it.
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