Wisconsin governor to end ALL collective bargaining rights for state workers.
- Thread starter Fedayn
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Fine, but ALL tax money does in fact ultimately come from the private sector. The private sector funds the public sector. That's just the way it works.
Louis MacNeice
Autumn Journalist
No all money (as an expression of exchange value) ultimately comes from labour; public sector and private sector.
Louis MacNeice
Obviously. Asswipe.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
Nope, it really isn't. Even a freshman economics student wouldn't claim something so obviously built on a particular interpretation of economics rather than economics as a practice. There isn't a "cart before horse" situation in modernity - public and private are mutually dependent. Private capital cannot accumulate (except in the primitive mode) without the existence of a state to facilitate it, and vice versa.
This isn't "rocket science", this is basic stuff that gets taught in the first couple of months of study.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
I learned that particular point in "O" level history classes around 35 years ago. Tom, who I can only presume is an adult, doesn't appear to have learned it at all.
binka
!!!!!!!!!
interestingly they had that berk from the taxpayers alliance on bbc news just after the protests in london and he made the same claim - that the only productive labour was private and that essentially every single person employed by the state is a net drain on resources. of course he wasnt challenged by the non entity who was supposed to be conducting an interview
He was of course talking nonsence & that's not the argument I'm making.
This is indeed not rocket science. You & Louis are using the old argument from authority technique. You're right because that's what's taught in school. This holds no water with me. You are avoiding making your own argument.
Of course public & private labor are mutually dependant. Public labor can build a road, pass & enforce laws, provide education & in doing so the private sector is enhanced. But they do this with funds from taxes on the private sector. I stand by my statement that ALL tax money ultimately comes from the private sector.
Miss Caphat
I want it that way
how would you feel if your private sector employer told you that if they hadn't made the initial investment in their business, you would have no job and therefore should not be entitled to any benefits or security, and should basically owe your life to them.I'd get another job.
I'm not saying that public employees are not entitled to any benefits or security or that they owe their life to their employer. I'm saying they aren't entitled to special rights unavaliable to private sector workers who provide their pay & benefits. I don't want a gov where nobody can ever be fired no matter how bad a job they do. This is an abuse of the public.
In the state where I live in they do. State workers can't be fired, have generous (sometimes obcenely generous) pensions for life, contribute nothing to their pension plans & pay nothing for their health insurance. I know one person who makes $80,000 (almost 49,000 pounds)/yr and will get that for life upon retirement. Even gets a state subsidized gym membership for $4/mo (a $100/mo value). This person is so incompetent they wouldn't last a month in the private sector. Sounds pretty special to me.They don't get "special rights".
Louis MacNeice
Autumn Journalist
No I'm saying that arguing it because it is true not because it is taught (which it often isn't as you so ably demonstrate); show me value not ceated or made available by labour?
Louis MacNeice
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Tom is the first non libertarian American I've come across that thinks this way.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
Except that neither of us have actually made such a claim. I merely observed that what I said isn't advanced economic theory, it's the basic stuff you get taught early on in any study of economics. Hardly an argument from authority, more a summation of fact.
Actually, if you stir your arse to read post # 336, you'll note that I've already made my argument.
It's always amusing being accused of making a poor argument by someone who resorts to an argument reductio ad absurdum, which is what you have to do to give your argument any validity.
Set out your argument as a progression through stages and you'll find that where you start from isn't "the private sector" at all, unless of course your argument is so reductive that it concentrates only on the end-stage, and on none of the preceding stages.
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
How did they accumulate such "rights", Tom?
They weren't gifted them on a silver platter, they collectively negotiated for them. Those they negotiated with should be the object of your ire if you're that exercised about the subject. You know, the state politicians who decided that the unions should be ceded their demands!
Oh, and utilising a single anecdotal case as if it proves your point? The tactics of a fool. It merely makes you look petty and self-interested 9well, more so than usual).
Miss Caphat
I want it that way
Well, that's just the thing. We don't want all of our public servants to be out looking for other jobs. The sad fact is many public sector workers have been living in fear of job cuts, or have actually had their jobs cut in the past several years. My mother was one of those people before she retired. Every single year for the last five, her very important job (as a counselor in a school system with many, many economically disadvantaged and at-risk kids) was hanging by a thread at budget time, and there would be all kinds of meetings about who and who wasn't going to lose their jobs, and everyone would become a nervous wreck.
I know this isn't much worse than it's been in the public sector, but just one example out of millions that public sector isn't some bed of roses like you seem to think.
I also don't think you're getting the point that arguing that someone should have less benefits at their job does not and will not ever equal better benefits for you. In fact, the opposite is more likely to be true. Remember that even in the private sector, there are gov't regulations on employees rights. You think that if they can successfully strip more of the rights of public sector workers, they won't move on to the private sector and try the same thing there? I'm sure many disgruntled (former?) public sector workers would happily vote for such a measure to get even with those who wanted to take their rights (and their jobs) away.
Why do you not think that everyone should be entitled to good benefits, job security, etc? know you've already "explained" but I think you really need to question who you are interpreting as your enemy.
Their unions got them those rights by donating tons of money to politicians & threatening to strike if they didn't get their way. They also used loads of money to fund a misleading ad campaign to scare the public into voting higher taxes during the worst recession since the great depression.
The politicians that slavishly give them what they want are the object of my ire. I used to vote Dem in state elections believing that that party protected the average people more than the Repubs. Those days are over. I voted Rebub in state races in 2010 (holding my nose while doing so) & will as long as the Dems dance like puppets on strings to the state gov unions. I see them as acting very similar to the slimiest businesses...they don't give a damn who gets hurt as long as they get what they want. I also stopped making small donations to the state Dems & doing volunteer work for them. I don't appreciate being hoodwinked. I can vote Repub in state races because those in my state aren't completely crazy like the nat Repubs.
I used that single case to demonstrate that gov unions don't necessairaly represent just average working folks as they would have the public believe.
nino_savatte
No pasaran!
This is part of a widespread myth that has been advanced by the Right to divert attention from the fact that millionaire and billionaire donors also donate loads of money to political parties. But my question to you would be this - which is more democratically accountable? Trade unions or oligarchs?
Oh and didn't Nixon appeal to union members back in the 70's? He did and many union members voted for the Repubs...until they got shafted by Reagan.
_angel_
.
More BBC fail. You'd think being publically funded themselves might have occurred to say summat.
So far in this recession very few public sector workers have feared for their jobs. They are just now starting to feel the pressure. Your mom is an exception. The federal stimulus program gave lots of money to the states to prevent gov layoffs. That's fine up to a point. But private sector workers have by far borne the brunt of this crisis. Now that public sector workers are starting to be threatened, all of a sudden we hear cries of opression & see mass protests. I just can't feel much sympathy when most gov workers said nothing as long as they were OK. And in my state they launched an attack on private sector workers in the form of tax increases to protect themselves. This isn't about me being better off although I have gotten some cuts as have most in the private sector have. I'm doing OK. It's about what I see as a priviledged minority playing the victim. It would be great if everyone had job security & good pensions, but these should not be reserved for gov union workers at the expense of other workers
I realize the real enemy are the financial industry crooks that caused this crisis.
Idris2002
canadian girlfriend
Yet you reserve your ire for the public sector workers? Are you an idiot, or just a clever troll?
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
Proof of these donations, and additional proof that such funding isn't common practice for all groups, including the private sector, that lobby politicians, please (because I know you wouldn't want to "accidentally" hold the public and private sectors to different standards of evidence!).
Which has exactly what to do with their established right to collectively bargain?
Politicians follow the power. Like calls unto like. If they see the main chance residing with supporting the public sector, that's how they'll roll. If private capital gives them good reason to get behind it, they'll roll that way instead.
For someone who's attempting to present himself as cool-headed and analytical, you're sure queering your own pitch!
And all it demonstrates is that in one case that was so.
Miss Caphat
I want it that way
.it's not just in a recession that public sector workers face job cuts, it's all the time, depending on very local elections and budget decisions. I know my mom is not "an exception" because look at the facts, even in the school system alone...how many art, music, drama teachers, coaches (anyone who's not considered essential) have lost their positions in the last decade?
If the federal stimulus gave money to the public sector it was because it was desperately needed.
If the federal stimulus gave money to the public sector it was because it was desperately needed.
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Just plain wrong and by a huge amount. At least half a million have gone already.
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