Lessons for us from Wisconsin

Our opinion: There are better ways to address government spending and concerns about undue power of public employee unions than a divisive, distracting  assault on organized labor. New York has opportunities it should seize.

Dramatic as it was, Wisconsin’s gubernatorial recall vote was really only a pointed example of the growing tension among governments, public employee unions and taxpayers around the nation. It’s a tension that’s just as real in New York.

But New York can avoid escalation into the kind of turmoil that consumed Wisconsin if state leaders and unions are willing to remove stumbling blocks that they’ve put in their own way.

It’s easy, as talk radio and cable TV quickly did, to reduce Wisconsin to a simplistic narrative. The 1 percent vs. the 99 percent. Tea Party vs. liberals. Corporations vs. unions. The vindication of Gov. Scott Walker and his agenda. The victory of big money. The rejection by voters of the use of a recall vote as a grudge match.

But there are complex realities behind this tension that such pat conclusions ignore. Taxpayers in Wisconsin, like those in New York, have long complained that government is living beyond its means. Yet, like New Yorkers, they don’t want services to diminish.

Many in both states blame the power of public employee unions and their influence over state legislators, who have passed laws giving unions certain advantages in negotiations and pensions whose costs threaten the ability of local governments to hold down taxes and maintain services. At the same time, no fair-minded person wants to deny public employees good pay, benefits and union representation.

We won’t pretend to solve all that in a few words here. Instead, we offer some modest suggestions.

In New York, the complaint that unions have an unfair bargaining advantage stems largely from the Triborough Amendment of the Taylor Law, which governs public employment. It mandates that the terms of a public employee contract must stay in force until a new one is negotiated. In exchange, public employees don’t strike.

While that doesn’t apply to raises, it does protect step increases and certain other automatic pay hikes. Even when their contracts expire, then, many public workers receive fairly generous pay hikes, taking the pressure off unions to negotiate and adding tens of millions of dollars a year in automatic extra costs for governments and school districts.

A coalition of mayors, school boards and businesses offers a sensible reform to Triborough: freeze step increases when contracts expire. All the non-monetary aspects of labor contracts would be protected, but a disincentive for unions to negotiate would end.

Meanwhile, the Public Employees Federation has long complained, quite credibly, that the state’s push to replace employees with private contractors often winds up costing taxpayers more. Against study after study from PEF, the state offers scant evidence to the contrary.

There’s a way to settle this argument: The Senate should follow the Assembly’s lead and pass legislation to require state agencies to do public-private cost comparisons. It’s just common business sense.

There are, to be sure, plenty of other ways to save money and relieve governments and school districts from onerous mandates. But these two stand out for their symbolism and simplicity. Amending Triborough would signal that New York can better balance the relationship between government and public employee unions without a polarizing assault on organized labor. Doing an honest study of the cost of private contractors and public employees would show that the state and unions can work as partners to save money.

It might not be the beginning of a beautiful friendship, but it could be a way keep things from turning, as they did in Wisconsin, very ugly.

20 Responses

  1. Carmanone says:

    This guy is living in la-la land. New Yorkers need to do exactly what Wisconsin did. A “beautiful friendship” with the unions ? You have to be kidding…..

  2. Albany Resident says:

    “The victory of big money.” Of course that statement swings both ways, Barrack Obama way outspent John McCain in Wisconsin and generally across the nation on his unfortunate victory. It was “big money” that won him the election, big money and the ill-informed, “the sky is falling, the sky is falling”, electorate.
    “At the same time, no fair-minded person wants to deny public employees good pay, benefits and union representation.” I consider myself a “fair minded person”, but at the same time I know that the “good pay” is way too good, the “benefits” are bloated packages, and the “union representation” is too powerful. In NYS as in other states the “public servant” is no longer the “servant”, the private sector taxpayer has become the servant. The public employee has the unbridled ability to enrich their financial status while diminishing that of the private sector. The government simply raises taxes to enrich themselves thusly diminishing the quality of life for the private taxpayer. Some in “public service” would claim that it is the “contractors” whom cost the taxpayer more. I simply cannot believe that a contractor that is hired by the state to perform a function and then moves on to another project, as the vast majority do, cost the taxpayer more than a full time state employee. They don’t!
    What happened in Wisconsin is a good thing; it shows that democracy is still alive and that the everyday folk can fight back against the thuggery of public unions and win.

  3. CarlKorn says:

    While I appreciate the Times Union’s call for civility and compromise, amending Triborough to allow school boards and local governments to freeze step increases would have the opposite effect. It would undoubtedly lead to the kind of bitter polarization we saw in Wisconsin. If a contract expires and steps are frozen — and the wages of workers are frozen in place — what would be the incentive for school boards, for example, to bargain a new contract? Many would simply say, “tough luck.” The balance of power maintained by Triborough would disappear, and public employees would be at the mercy of government and school boards — and without the legal right to strike. The “labor peace” we enjoy would disappear. Collective bargaining isn’t always pretty, but there have been more than 150 teacher contract settlements in NY in the last six months, even with Triborough. The system works, and amending it would lead to the exact opposite environment you are calling for.

  4. JR says:

    What is really needed, in my mind is two things. If you are going to abolish the Triborough Amendment then you need to do the following which I think would be fair to all parties. Both the Unions and Administration have three months before the end of a contract to start negotiate something. Sixty days past the end of the contract whatever has been agreed to is set and the rest of the issues get sent to binding arbitration who issues a decision within 90 days. Second, all campaign contribution should be eliminated and all officers run via public financed campaigns. That way neither party can hold up the process and you take money influences out of the equation for the most part. Might not be the most perfect solution, but it would be a start.

    As for everyone who is “UNION” Bashing, stop complaining. The unions are doing exactly what they are suppose to do which is looking out after their membership. And Corporate Boards do the same which is to protect their stockholders interests. And both are guilty of using their purse strings to influence the political environment. Unfortunately the public only has the ballot box which the majority chose not to use.

  5. SR says:

    So, Carmanone, like most of the people who bash public employees – I understand that you don’t know what you’re talking about. Do you even realize how much government spends on high priced consultants (i.e. TAXPAYER money). The average consultant makes 2x what state workers make.

    Also, the politicians, who are ELECTED, are also paid with TAXPAYER money.. They get full pensions and free health insurance forever.

    Any comments regarding these two points?

  6. Miller says:

    You say the unions have an unfair advantage. If you take away the Tri bourgh what is there to stop the state from doing the same thing and not bargin in a timely fashion. This encourges bargining in good faith. If you take away the tribourgh are you going to allow public employees to strike. What would you do without police and fire protection. No teachers in schools. Make everyone bargin in a timely fashion. My employer has been asked to the table since last September and they just agreed to meet and they had no proposal for the meeting. They stated that they needed for time. Thats what the Tribourgh is about. Both sides can create or fix the problem it is not always the employee that is the problem.

  7. Joe says:

    The only problem with this suggestion is that the State does not bargain in good faith. Their negotiators come in and give you their proposals, which is always zeros and not offering any reasonable deal to the union negotiators. Then they walk out and say take it or leave it. That’s why it always takes so long to get a contract.

  8. bustercasey says:

    I do not agree that Triborough needs to be appealed, but I appreciate the tenor of the editorial board’s message. Dramatic reform of individuals’ rights is not the answer. Government by fiat and divisiveness is not what our founding fathers envisioned. We must return to a country of reasonableness and dialogue.

  9. Tony says:

    Even FDR realized that public employees should not be unionized as it pits citizen against citizen and is very divisive and he stood against the idea of public sector unions. An expample: influenced by union contributions, legislators permit both themselves and public employee union members defined benefit pension plans at the expense of the taxpaying citizens who don’t have and can’t afford these retirement plans. Public employees are protected from the effects of market fluctuations on their retirement plan because the taxpayers are responsible for the unfunded liablities of these plans while their own savings and retirment funds are subject to market fluctuations. You have only to look at your local school budgets to see that the vast majority of budget increases are due to required pension fund contributions. So, if you are really interested in an honest discussion of this subject, you have to admit that public sector unions have divided us just as FDR knew they would.

  10. Mark says:

    The one constant in the universe is the Times Union’s support of the overbloated, overpaid, corrupt, inefficient entity called the union.

    They are the primary reason the Northeast is known as the rust belt.

    The teacher’s union pads their wallets and their pensions as New york spends more money per student than most of the nation, with lousey results. Unions are inefficient and counter productive to cost effectiveness and competetition, they are also a form of socialism.

    The unions will eventually bankrupt New York State. Unfortuneatley, there is not one politician in New York (Republican or Democrat)
    who has the guts Scott Walker did to stand up to them. Now I believe many leaders (not in New York) will follow Walker’s lead, let’s hope so.

    As for big money poured into Wisconsin, get real, the Democrats poured in a ton of money too, besides who cares, the voters voted. Is the Times Union suggesting that the vote was invalid? If not, then why are you complaining, the people spoke and they spoke for Walker.

    As for the Times Union Editorial board, your supposedly big defenders of the democratic process of voting, I guess that only applies if the vote goes your way.

    What a hypocritical editorial……….

  11. Cathy says:

    NY public employee unions don’t strike??? What planet are you living on???

  12. Lakeman says:

    Don’t blame the employees or unions that repesent them. They just ask for all they can get and the lawmakers give it to them for votes,

  13. Victor Blackthorne says:

    To save money put state government on a four day work week. This change will allow the state to save one day’s energy cost. Stop funding CO2 mitigation projects is another way to save money. As matters now stand the state has estimates of how much CO2 mitigation has been achieved with state funding, but they have no idea how much climate mitigation has been achieved, nor do they have an explanation as to why reforestation is not used to lessen CO2 levels.

  14. Ralph Mitchell says:

    The TU writer has to go one step further and mention Robert Castelli’s
    Assembly bill to Amend the Triborough Amendment. Why hasn’t Speaker
    Shelly Silver and the Assembly embraced Castelli’s bill? The silence
    is deafening……………!

  15. Skip says:

    Progressive Wisconsin led the way with government unions way back in the 50’s, and Wisconsin still leads today. Let’s follow Wisconsin’s lead.

  16. anyman says:

    I think you have a mistaken idea as to what “step increases” are. They are a gradual (now over 7 years) climb from what is called the “hiring rate” to the “job rate”. Before the last fiscal crisis, the climb took 4 years. Very early on there were no such thing as “step increases”, “hiring rates” and “job rates”. There was just what the job paid, period. The step program began as a concession from unions to the state that wanted a cost savings in a further budget crisis in the past. So employees were hired at a rate below what the job used to pay with a path toward achieving full pay for the position if the employee was rated by his or her superiors at a level necessary to gain each annual step. To now say that step increases should be dependent on a contract settlement is absurd with this historical background. The Triborough Agreement was instituted as a protection from abuse by the employer (the state) since public employees were denied the most effective means of leverage any such employee has–the strike a/k/a, denying the employer his or her labor so as not to be working without the protection of a contract. I’m not arguing for the right of public employees to strike but I am opposed to revisionist history. If the public feels that there is too cozy a relationship between his or her representative and the unions, there is a solution available already. It’s called the ballot box. Public employee unions should be excoriated for using the exact same tactics as every other interest group in the state in order to protect their members’ welfare. As for Wisconsin being an example for New York (as some have stated here), Wisconsin has been bought lock, stock and barrel by the Koch brothers. Even if you have issues with public employee unions, if you think these guys care a whit about you, you are living in a dream world, my friend. Soon to become a nightmare.

  17. anyman says:

    “Public employee unions should be excoriated” should read “Public employee unions should NOT be excoriated”. (Fingers were going too fast, I guess.)

  18. GreenClown says:

    The statistics that PEF has provided on private contract costs vs, equivalent cost of state employees doing the equivalent professional work are not dis-honest, as implied by the concluding paragraph of the editorial: contractors get paid more for the same work. I think the editorial writer meant “unbiased” rather than “honest”.

  19. getting too old for this crap says:

    This editorial is not worth of being published. It raises so many unanswered questions, I expect more from an editorial board. First, qualify what you mean by “fairly generous pay hikes.” I think this is important for the reader to know before he/she can evaluate your position. Second, please qualify what is meant by “all non-monetary aspects of the contract would be protected” by amended the Triborough Agreement so the reader can determine if public employees should be willing to give up the right to strike in exchange for these “non-monetary aspects.” Finally, it’s nice to see the TU finally identifying other ways to save money, but when are we going to see the TU actually discuss these ways. The TU has long been part of the divisive atmosphere, this could be the beginning of it’s leadership in sensibly discussing ways to curb government spending, but I’m still waiting on articles that don’t focus on State employees’ pay.