Facts and Talking Points for the Wisconsin Budget Showdown

Government employee union reform proposals in Gov. Walker’s budget repair bill:

• Limits collective bargaining for most government sector employees to wages only, with wages capped to inflation;
• Union members given the opportunity to vote every year to keep their union;
• State can no longer collect union dues;
• Requires union members to contribute 5.8% of their salary toward their pensions and 12.6% to the cost of their health insurance premiums.
  • The comparable nationwide employee healthcare contribution is 20% according to the BLS.
  • The comparable employee contribution for retirement was 7.5% in 2009, according to the Employee Benefits Research Institute

The bottom line:

• This is about balancing the budget;
• Compared to the national average, it is a modest proposal to ask government workers to contribute to their healthcare and pension;
• The Governor’s full proposal will save $300 million and prevent approximately 5,500 layoffs of state workers and a similar amount of local government employees and teachers. As a result the Governor’s budget will not include furloughs or layoffs;
• Workers will save money because union dues will not be required or collected by the government;
• This bill has had over 17 hours of public hearings and vigorously debated. It is time for a vote;

You can read about about the private and public sector fact sheet on Newt.org.
The Governor is doing what he was elected to do. His state is in debt. State’s cannot print money like the federal gov’t can so he has to cut somewhere. The unions are scared because they believe he is taking power away from them (probably because members can vote every year to keep their unions. Union bosses don’t like that for sure.) Maybe, but they had a free ride in the state and that is coming to an end. I like everything in the bill. I think it is a fair bill.
One other thing. All those Democrats that ran and hid so a bill couldn’t be passed are cowards. I would say the same thing if the Republicans did the same thing. You stay and argue your case. If you lose the argument then so be it. That’s the way it is. To paraphrase Obama: The Republicans won. Deal with it.