Unions nationwide are in an uproar over legislation signed in Wisconsin limiting collective bargaining for their public employees. Nonpublic unions, like the wealthy and politically powerful AFL-CIO, are mobilizing and fundraising, claiming the changes affect them, but they don’t. Public employee unions are hugely different than private unions. Public employees in most states don’t have collective bargaining at all or to the extent that Wisconsin did. Neither do federal employees.
Taxpayers pay for public employees. Should public employee unions use collective bargaining with state representatives who are paid and elected by taxpayers, many of whom are also public employees? Public employees use funds from taxpayer-paid salaries to pay their union to spend heavily in elections to elect candidates who return the favor by easily agreeing to enhanced salaries and benefits for public employees, meaning taxpayers aren’t fairly represented at the bargaining table. Each year percentage increases paid to public employees are larger than what most taxpayers themselves receive in pay and benefit increases. This is part of the reason property, sales and income taxes unsustainably increase.
In Wisconsin, the taxpayers simply elected a governor to fairly represent them and the union uproar is because he isn’t in their pocket.
Chris Forzano
La Center
