Unions Continue To Control The California Democratic Party
With California issuing out IOUs for almost 2 weeks and the $26 billion dollar budget gap not even close to being closed, many are quickly beginning to wonder how the state got into this mess in the first place. One common opinion is that Karen Bass’s hyperpartisanship is preventing a reasonable budget from being negotiated. This notion assumes that Karen Bass makes her decisions independently. Unfortunately, there is an even larger foe that dictated the actions of the California Democratic Party — California’s public employee labor unions.
The California Democratic Party is largely controlled by labor unions. The California Republican Party has recently brought this issue to light with the launch of www.powerofthepurple.com. A play on the common phrase “power of the people” the CRP website exposes the tactic of the Service Employee International Union — commonly known as the SEIU — to have their supporters wear purple to rallies and protests.
While the new use of purple by taxpayers is more of a mockery of the SEIU, it brings to light the harsh reality of the control that public employees — mainly the SEIU and the California Teachers Association — have over the Democrats. It has been said that without the support of the California Teachers Association the Democratic Leadership wont even consider a statewide ballot proposition — fearing their opposition dooms it to fail.
Additionally, public employee unions get Democrats elected to office. Since unions charge mandatory dues to their members specifically for the purpose of political activities, they are able to dump large amounts of money into the campaign accounts of Democrat candidates — well beyond the legally mandated limits for individuals. Local union organizations also provide the footsoldiers needed to walk precincts in local neighborhoods.
This complete control over Democrats has led to amazing deals for unions during contract negotiation time. Specifically, this has lead to more than generous retirement packages for California public employees through the CalPERS program and California K-12 teachers through the CalSTERS Program. Governor Schwarzenegger in his recent swing to fiscal conservatism has suggested reforming the retirement programs — leading to Karen Bass’s boycotting budget talks.
Even as the California economy crumbles under the weight of their bloated contracts, labor unions — mainly the SEIU continue to stick to their talking points. Realistic budget reforms require either a reductions in union member pay, or layoffs of union members. Unfortunately union members protect their jobs — no matter the cost. It’s no surprise that California has operated on a deficit for the last 9 years — public employee unions are ruining the economy.
This article is an intellectual insult!
It is akin to walking into a room full of red apples, picking one up, and saying “this apple is red, so THIS apple is bad” and ignoring all the other red apples in the room.
To begin with, the term “control” in this article is unfair and only reflects the authors obvious bias. It is unfair becuase it alludes to some sort of nefarious acts on the part of unions. Participating in the political process is a positive thing, it is a good thing that union members walk precincts and phone bank on behalf of candidates. They realize that what happens in government impacts them, just as it impacts all of us, and they choose to be proactive about it. Instead of calling it “control,” why not call it influence, a more accurate term without the negative connotation of “control.”
Which brings me to the authors bias. This article spends a great deal of time discussing SEIU’s T-shirt color, but at no time mentions that unions are just one of many groups that assert influence in Sacramento. In fact, a March article in the Sacramento Bee lists the top 10 lobbyist spenders, out of those, business groups spent close to triple that of unions, with an oil industry group topping the list.
It was my impression that the mission statement of this blog was the following: “The purpose of The Policy Report is to inject common sense debate and analysis on public policy issues into a world of spin and extreme partisanship…”
This article reflects none of that.
If Unions were merely an “influence” upon the majority party in California and the business lobby was so powerful by comparison then California would not have the 6th highest business tax burden and be losing 8,000 businesses to Nevada, Texas and Mexico each each year.
The proof is in the pudding. Union members enjoy the most lavish benefits packages known to man (CTA members make 35% more than the national average for teachers, for example) while jobs continue to be lost in California even when we have a good economy. That is quite more than influence by any fair measure.
If Unions only “influence” the process, Karen Bass wouldn’t be abandoning ship from budget negotiations to avoid having to break her campaign promises to Union leaders.
The truth is Unions control the California Democratic Party, forcing them to make decisions that have devastated the economy.