MapleLeafAlliance

I hope Mr. Walker is successful, but I hope he recognizes all public sector unions must be broken. Well no, it is about whether you believe in the good of the nanny-State or you don't. A union willing to discuss financials means going into the books wielding a scalpel where only a machete will do.

Yes.

What larger issue...trying to reduce debt by reducing the size of government? I'm all for it.

Of course I am...very few people aren't in today's economy. But I don't worry about it as some failing of virtue, I recognize debt has become a necessary evil for most people in the face of an ever-rising cost of living that comes with over-reaching government.

If the uber-left Mother Jones mag is correct, and what the WI governor is doing is all just a political game, then he is just as clueless as the rest. If the civil servants who comprise the police, and other public safety unions think they are immune from the cutting...they have another thing coming. I don't advocate ending just the teacher's public sector union...I advocate ending all public sector unions as I've said from the start. If the governor is that short-sighted to only target one public sector union, then he's an idiot and he deserves to be impeached. The Democrats who are fighting to keep the unions in play? They're rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic...they just don't realize the iceberg's already been hit.

I don't need to read the Wisconsin Labor Code to understand why public sector unions are a damaging entity. I don't need to read the entire Patriot Act to know it needs to be repealed, do you? I don't need to read the entire NAFTA agreement to know that it stinks to high heaven. Do you? The teachers in WI can and will strike if their union is not given the concessions any union expects come contract renewal time. Do you really need to read an onerous book of legalese to figure that concept out? Union workers strike...they hold out for more...it's been done for a long time. And I argue it should not be an option for those being paid by taxpayers...it amounts to extortion. Are you new? The US is in the middle of a massive debt crisis and Wisconsin is not immune...they're bleeding red ink all over the place. In the face of that crisis, it is unsustainable to keep giving raises to those who are being paid by an ever more indebted entity. That's not conjecture...there is a debt crisis...it is happening...no amount of ignoring it will change that. I don't need to give you proof that there's a problem, by now it should be apparent to you and everyone else with a pulse.

I'm engaged...I'm right here...but you continually confuse a free market economy with what's happening around us today. You've somehow gotten it into your head that to be pro freedom must mean anti worker when just the opposite is the case. I've refuted pretty much every anti-free market point you've made...how much more "engaged" would you like me to be?

If someone starts up a business as a means of earning a lot of money (i.e. greed), and in so doing employs people would might otherwise be unemployed, what's the harm? If a business expands in a free market because it's goal is dominance...more jobs are created, more innovation is realized, products are offered for less, and the quality of said product improves...how is any of that a bad thing? The typical reaction by those on the left to the idea of a free market is to throw up failed experiments (i.e. communism) to look at as harbingers, and then draw on emotional responses to provocative buzzwords (greed, dominance, etc)as a means of discrediting what's obviously a logical solution to government overreach. Congrats on fitting in with the rest.

Again, the amount you get paid does not matter as much as what your relative wealth is...and in a free market economy, where you keep most if not all of what you earn, and where competitiveness reigns...the cost of living is greatly reduced, and even while nominally you make less - in terms of purchasing power and wealth, you have more. You're still not getting it. Of course in a free market there'd be extremely low paying jobs. Not everyone's level of skill, aptitude, work ethic, overall value of labour is the same - and people would be paid commensurate to what they offer. Is it really ethical to expect all taxpayers to pay for salaries and benefits that go to workers who don't deserve to earn that amount...and with little oversight to boot? Right, because that's not the society we live in now? Give me a break. Another argument in favour of a free market economy. In a free market it won't matter what the corporate management intentions are...it'd be sink-or-swim...no promises of government bailouts, no subsidies...they'd have to get by from their profits alone. That means providing customers with a quality product at a competitive price. Doing so would require hiring and keeping good workers...if they choose to treat workers poorly or pay less than their labour is worth, they'll go to a competitor and that company could face bankruptcy because it focused more on "power and control" (to use your words) than on quality, and good practices. Yes, trying to get out of debt is terribly evil. In the private sector I'm with you...but when its taxpayers paying for pay and benefits, there should be no "collective bargaining" (a.k.a. union-based extortion) involved.

State Cheese Inspector? In a free market economy there'd be no such position. And if said cheese inspector were in the private sector and found it hard to move laterally, he/she would need to re-train, move into a different career...do something different. And what are you talking about, "not in practice"...the society in which we currently live is nowhere near a free market...no society is. Given how dire the current situation is with the mixed economy we've tried for decades now, I think it's time we give freedom a go.

It's not about "crushing" workers rights, that's rich...crushing the rights of teachers making what, 40k+ a year? It's about recognizing the unsustainable path of unions demanding more in the face of massive amounts of debt. In the private sector, at least if a union there decides to hold out for more, people have a choice whether to support the costs incurred from higher wages/benefits...but in the public sector where all taxpayers foot the bill collective bargaining becomes basic extortion.

There's a disconnect here...you don't get it. Taxes will never pull a government out of debt because the only way a government can operate is at a debt to taxpayers - government is an administrative body that doesn't produce anything, and requires private wealth to operate. Increasing taxes means more wealth must be taken out of the private sector to pay for government, and it's a cycle without end. The way out of debt is to shrink government to a sustainable size, and to end government interference in the economy so that the private sector can grow, and more wealth can be created across a greater swath of the population. Asking government to grow via taxation in order to provide more wealth has the entire scenario a$$-backwards.

Who cares how much you make if you live in a free market where products/services are free of taxes/regulation, and companies existing in a sink-or-swim economy would be focused on being competitive i.e. providing goods/services for lower costs and at higher levels of quality? Government interference through corporate favoritism, and subsidies mitigate risk, and drive up costs for consumers. The dollar figure of what you earn is a relative number. You can make very little and still enjoy a lot of relative wealth. Inflated prices are the result of too much government involvement in the economy, not the opposite. And with less taxation required to pay for things like inflated teacher salaries you'd be free to keep more of what you earn, and spend it as you see fit. That's freedom. "shareholder value" and "upwards redistribution" are byproducts of our current corporatist system where the lines between government and corporations are blurred.

The only reason the standard of living is driven down is because government is too big, and the private sector too small. Public sector unions don't create more wealth, they destroy it. Every time the government has to pay for a program, a department or its employees it does so by taking money out of the private sector - i.e. the only place where real wealth can be created. The government creates nothing but debt. I am an Albertan, yes. A Wildrose Alliance Party supporter, no.

This mess in Wisconsin is indicative of a greater philosophical debate whose time has apparently come. The seeds for this fight in WI were sown years ago when it was decided that government must provide what's now known as "public education". Public education requires all taxpayers to pay for all costs contained therein...so when teachers become part of a union, and the wages continually go up with each management v. union "compromise", taxpayers feel the pinch. A government already requiring debt to operate, and in the US where most of the population is highly indebted, it's become harder and harder to make ends meet i.e. pay all of the civil servants under its charge. Given that WI is in the red, it makes no sense to make the problem worse, or kick the can down to the road for a future generation to suffer so that a union can continue to "bargain" for more and more. The entire premise of continual raises in the public sector is unsustainable, especially when the public sector is dead flat broke.

Instead of trying to insult me, how about getting to the point? Where do you disagree with what I've said, and why?

Explain.

Right, because in the current economy they have so many other job opportunities busting down their door? You take the work where you can get it today...very few have the luxury of picking and choosing union-job or non-union job...when you're in debt up to your eyeballs, a job's a job. What makes more sense at the beginning of a career? Forget changing contracts for public sector unions...get rid of those unions altogether...thus nullifying any contracts with same. The situation in Wisconsin? Civil servants being told there'll be no more collective bargaining because the state is broke and cannot afford continual raises in pay and better benefits at the expense of all WI taxpayers...that situation? That entire mess highlights the problem with expecting the government to provide education. Government's involvement in education means robbing Peter to pay Paul...it is unsustainable, and as we're seeing it doesn't work. You cannot get blood from a stone...broke is broke. Already working on changing it. Me move? It isn't going to come to that, freedom will win in the end. It's the socialists that will wind up migrating to a more Statist environment. It's not about fairness...that's completely subjective. It's about what makes sense and what doesn't...about what is efficient, and what creates waste. It's about living in a society driven by logic or a distinct lack thereof. Signed contract or not...the entire idea of civil servants being allowed to collectively bargain invites the kind of inefficiency, wasteful spending, and conflict we're seeing now. It doesn't have to be this way, nor logically should it be.

Your rant against freedom doesn't hold water because you speak as if we already have a free market economy here in Canada or in the US. We don't, and they don't. We have a mixed economy...a welfare-state...freedom is the solution, not the problem.

In a centrally-planned, highly-controlled economy like ours, jobs are becoming more scarce meaning you take one when you can find it...regardless of whether it's a unionized job or not. In a free market, without government interference, there'd be an abundance of jobs so then maybe you would have the luxury of being so picky as to whether or not you'd like to join a union. What have I said about public sector unions is "patently absurd"? Please explain.

Of course not, but in a free market it wouldn't matter. In a free market with plenty of private sector jobs, people would be more free to choose where they work - and companies would have more incentive to provide a better working environment and/or better pay/benefits to keep talent from competitors. Grey-area terms such as fair and unfair don't really apply in a free market. There is under-valued, and over-valued. If you feel your skills and/or your labour are being under-valued by your employer you can take your skills/labour somewhere else. If an employer feels you are lacking in skills or work ethic, they will pay you accordingly or let you go. In a free market there are jobs for everyone...but the rates of pay will be much more commensurate with the value of the workers' skills/labour as businesses recognize that survival rests on keeping overhead low, but also quality of product high. Explain. Happy about that? If you feel your skills are being under-valued in your current workplace you would benefit greatly from a free market economy where your income would be commensurate with what you bring to the table. Sure you could. Don't get me wrong...I'm not anti-union in the private sector. I think unions in the private sector are fine if that's the way companies want to go. You mean you choose to take less in order to keep your employer's overhead low? That's great for competitiveness...I don't see why you wouldn't be in favor of a free market economy.

I gathered that...care to explain why?

You're so confused. Pro corporate? Try pro liberty. Freedom isn't a limited premise...it doesn't begin and end with the business world...it extends out to include everyone.

How about spending more time understanding free market economics (i.e. the only way out of our debt crisis), and less time trying to conveniently label those you disagree with?

No facts to back up what, exactly? The larger the government, the less free are its constituents...that's logic. Civil servants threatening to walk out from providing an essential service (in this case educating children) is a form of extortion - and it's taxpayers who have to 'pay up or else'. When does the cycle end? It doesn't...every time a union signs a new contract it expects a bump in pay and/or benefits. In the private sector, that's fine...in the public sector...when everyone including the government is broke? It's unsustainable and must be stopped. Do you really need a textbook to help you understand this?