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it happened in CT when they “privatized’ group home facilities and nursing homes. it was such a big deal, and wages plumeted with the contractor’s people making less than half what the staet people did. of course, they couldn’t get good labor for that rate, but what the hey? it’s saving money, right? who cared if teh patient care quality went down?

then the employees unionized. and their wages rose sharply. a lot of that cash savings was gone. then they went on strike - which the state employees couldn’t do. and got even more. but nowhere did anyone give a rat’s @$$ about the level of care to the patients. so that remained in the gutter.

so now the cost of running the state’s nursing homes is higher than before, they’re constantly picketing the legislature for more money, and striking, and etc.

but they privatized! isn’t that a good thing?

there was a study during the Bush I administration that showed exactly this: privatization does not save money. and teh unsaid deal is that what privatization does is provisde the political “ins” with another business to hit up for contributions.

i’m sorry that your envy clouds your vision. mosrt people realize that when the state runs something, there is no profit margin, but when they privatized, the profit margin enters into the pic. plus clients of whatever is affected are not protected from strikes, and poor administration. the federal study showed that in order to keep quality of service from suffering, there needs to be a strick monitoring system put into place - which almost universally isn’t. because when you factor in the cost of monitoring, the cost quickly exceeds any savings.

we need to think with out heads instead of our envy at the fortunes of others. the only way for the government to save money on something is to get out of it altogether. period.

too many people use econimic downturns to bust unions without appreciating what unions have done for all of us - union or not.