Wisconsin’s teachers’ union (WEAC) announced this week it is cutting 40% of its staff, a move it blames on Governor Scott Walker’s “union-busting” budget reform bill. I re-read the bill a couple more times, and nowhere could I find a single provision that reduced WEAC’s membership by a single person. Nowhere.
The AP news article covering the WEAC announcement did not cite any drop in membership, nor did it state that membership dues have fallen. So why would a teachers’ union cut 40% of its member-support jobs in Wisconsin right before the start of a school year, especially this year where so much is changing?
Since it offered no other explanation for its actions except that it is unhappy about who was elected Governor last year, it seems pretty clear that WEAC cut 40% of its workforce solely for the purpose of grabbing an anti-Walker headline the day before the recall election of two Democrat state senators. A compliant media gladly obliged, broadcasting the smear as if it were fact-checked.
Who treats their employees like dirt? Not the evil corporations or greedy CEOs the left rags on mindlessly day after day, but the very unionists who make their living fleecing the public and conning the soft-headed into thinking they care a whit about the working man. Not just any union, mind you, but WEAC - the posers who would have us believe they are all kindergarten teachers in calico dresses holding kittens and humming lullabies to sick children. Ok, except for that death-threat lady.
If a prominent Wisconsin company announced a 40% job cut without showing any loss of customers or citing any reduction in revenue, the screams of corporate greed and exploitation would rattle bratwursts off the grills all the way from Kenosha to Superior. By the way, WEAC’s executive director – the sackmeister - makes more than most CEO’s in Wisconsin; drum on that, comrades.
Recently, the head of the NEA stated openly the teachers’ unions do not care about kids; the actions of Milwaukee and Madison locals made it clear they do not care about teachers, either; and now we learn that WEAC doesn’t even care about their own workers. 42 jobs were tossed to influence a meaningless recall election. Own it, teachers. That is your union; that is what your dues have purchased. You paid to be represented by ruthless fools, and you got represented.
Governor Walker took bold action to reform the public sector workplace, and WEAC is now running the bully’s retreat. Walker should turn his attention to reforming the laws that govern private sector employment in this state. Lather, rinse, repeat. If he is serious about creating jobs in Wisconsin, he should pass Right To Work legislation now.
The moral argument for RTW is simple enough; involuntary association is an offense to liberty, and sanctioned extortion is still extortion. From a practical standpoint, compulsory unionization stifles innovation, punishes excellence, rewards sloth, protects incompetence, and promotes mediocrity.
In the private sector choice and competition drive innovation and excellence; free trade in goods, services, labor, and capital improve the quality, cost, and selection of articles for consumption. The abundance we enjoy was not legislated or voted by a simple majority; it was invented for profit and optimized through choice and competition in the free market.
Company price-fixing is illegal, and for good reason; fixing the risk of loss allows greed to run unchecked. But union labor price-fixing is exempt from anti-trust laws, and the result has been predictably devastating. In company after company, industry after industry, wherever unions thrive, companies and jobs die. Union membership has been in a free-fall for five decades in this nation; not because the deck is stacked against unions in elections, but because the parasite inevitably kills the host.
93% of private sector workers now choose to work free of union interference in their workplace; not because they are unaware of their right to form and join unions, but because they are acutely aware of the threats that unions pose to their livelihood and their liberties. The Obama administration is working urgently to rig the rules so that unions can be more easily imposed on unwilling workers. Time is of the essence.
Right To Work insures that each of us can exercise our Constitutional right to either join a union or work union-free. It prevents me from setting the terms and conditions for the exchange of your labor. It preserves your ownership over your own self. It protects us both from extortion – the forced payment of tribute to a third party.
There is no third-party “right” to seize profit from an economic exchange between free people. The right of association in the workplace has three facets: the right to form and join a union, the right to work union free, and the right to choose to bargain with a collective or with individual employees.
These are not privileges granted by government and subject to majority rule; these are individual rights that precede government. They are the Creator’s endowment to a free people. The question for Governor Walker is: when will he enact legislation to recognize it? We are waiting.
“Moment Of Clarity” is a weekly commentary by Libertarian writer and speaker Tim Nerenz, Ph.D. Visit Tim’s website www.timnerenz.com to find your moment.
The AP news article covering the WEAC announcement did not cite any drop in membership, nor did it state that membership dues have fallen. So why would a teachers’ union cut 40% of its member-support jobs in Wisconsin right before the start of a school year, especially this year where so much is changing?
Since it offered no other explanation for its actions except that it is unhappy about who was elected Governor last year, it seems pretty clear that WEAC cut 40% of its workforce solely for the purpose of grabbing an anti-Walker headline the day before the recall election of two Democrat state senators. A compliant media gladly obliged, broadcasting the smear as if it were fact-checked.
Who treats their employees like dirt? Not the evil corporations or greedy CEOs the left rags on mindlessly day after day, but the very unionists who make their living fleecing the public and conning the soft-headed into thinking they care a whit about the working man. Not just any union, mind you, but WEAC - the posers who would have us believe they are all kindergarten teachers in calico dresses holding kittens and humming lullabies to sick children. Ok, except for that death-threat lady.
If a prominent Wisconsin company announced a 40% job cut without showing any loss of customers or citing any reduction in revenue, the screams of corporate greed and exploitation would rattle bratwursts off the grills all the way from Kenosha to Superior. By the way, WEAC’s executive director – the sackmeister - makes more than most CEO’s in Wisconsin; drum on that, comrades.
Recently, the head of the NEA stated openly the teachers’ unions do not care about kids; the actions of Milwaukee and Madison locals made it clear they do not care about teachers, either; and now we learn that WEAC doesn’t even care about their own workers. 42 jobs were tossed to influence a meaningless recall election. Own it, teachers. That is your union; that is what your dues have purchased. You paid to be represented by ruthless fools, and you got represented.
Governor Walker took bold action to reform the public sector workplace, and WEAC is now running the bully’s retreat. Walker should turn his attention to reforming the laws that govern private sector employment in this state. Lather, rinse, repeat. If he is serious about creating jobs in Wisconsin, he should pass Right To Work legislation now.
The moral argument for RTW is simple enough; involuntary association is an offense to liberty, and sanctioned extortion is still extortion. From a practical standpoint, compulsory unionization stifles innovation, punishes excellence, rewards sloth, protects incompetence, and promotes mediocrity.
In the private sector choice and competition drive innovation and excellence; free trade in goods, services, labor, and capital improve the quality, cost, and selection of articles for consumption. The abundance we enjoy was not legislated or voted by a simple majority; it was invented for profit and optimized through choice and competition in the free market.
Company price-fixing is illegal, and for good reason; fixing the risk of loss allows greed to run unchecked. But union labor price-fixing is exempt from anti-trust laws, and the result has been predictably devastating. In company after company, industry after industry, wherever unions thrive, companies and jobs die. Union membership has been in a free-fall for five decades in this nation; not because the deck is stacked against unions in elections, but because the parasite inevitably kills the host.
93% of private sector workers now choose to work free of union interference in their workplace; not because they are unaware of their right to form and join unions, but because they are acutely aware of the threats that unions pose to their livelihood and their liberties. The Obama administration is working urgently to rig the rules so that unions can be more easily imposed on unwilling workers. Time is of the essence.
Right To Work insures that each of us can exercise our Constitutional right to either join a union or work union-free. It prevents me from setting the terms and conditions for the exchange of your labor. It preserves your ownership over your own self. It protects us both from extortion – the forced payment of tribute to a third party.
There is no third-party “right” to seize profit from an economic exchange between free people. The right of association in the workplace has three facets: the right to form and join a union, the right to work union free, and the right to choose to bargain with a collective or with individual employees.
These are not privileges granted by government and subject to majority rule; these are individual rights that precede government. They are the Creator’s endowment to a free people. The question for Governor Walker is: when will he enact legislation to recognize it? We are waiting.
“Moment Of Clarity” is a weekly commentary by Libertarian writer and speaker Tim Nerenz, Ph.D. Visit Tim’s website www.timnerenz.com to find your moment.
"If a prominent Wisconsin company announced a 40% job cut without showing any loss of customers or citing any reduction in revenue, the screams of corporate greed and exploitation would rattle bratwursts off the grills all the way from Kenosha to Superior."
ReplyDeleteIn fact, some school districts have added teachers because of the new law.
ReplyDeleteThis only shows how political large unions have become and why we need to reduce the influence of public sector unions.
Pretty insightful. Thanks!
ReplyDeleteMy blog:
courtier en credit rachat de credit
I forwarded this one to the local Newspaper's editor. He tends to lean toward the public union side, so he needs the enlightened logic that this will bring him.
ReplyDeleteThe huge sales job you do for RTW so that Wisconsin workers (and you actually include yourself here which is laughable) can be free to decline the union membership so that it will bring some sort of WAVE of new jobs has no basis!!!!
ReplyDeleteThe state of Oklahoma was the last state to do just that nine years ago. The result is that Oklahoma has lost 50,000 of the 170K manufacturing jobs that they had nine years ago. The unemployment rate is not significantly lower than neighboring or other states in America today either.
So, other than pushing wages down of working blue collar workers (and you are not in that class either), which also reduces TAXES collected, what is the benefit other than to pad the profits the companies earn. They already are sitting on record amounts of cash/capital that they won't invest in America or American jobs.
If the unions are driven out of American workplaces, the assault on everything that was gained will turn the working class into third world slaves themselves.
smells like ... stupidity. hey, and climate change is a fairy tale, too, douchebag.
ReplyDeleteI don't block comments, but I don't answer people who don't use their names.
ReplyDelete@Anon August 19, 2011 12:24 PM
ReplyDeleteFunny you should mention jobs leaving Oklahoma, since it caused me to recall details of the Mercury Marine debacle two years ago... I'm not sure how long we can keep these union jobs in the state if we have to fork over $70M+ each time a company wants to move to OK!
http://www.jsonline.com/business/69343837.html