Abbott and Costello Explain California for You
On the home page, Victor Davis Hanson has a devastating indictment of Road Warrior California, while over at NRO, Kevin Williamson piles on with “Penniless in Paradise,” about the parlous financial circumstances of the no-longer Golden State. It’s all very depressing to us semi-native Californians, who still harbor hopes that the best place to live in America can somehow yet be salvaged if the racket ruled by the state Democratic Party and the public-employee unions can ever be broken up.
The news, however, is not good. As Kevin points out in his piece, which concentrates on the dysfunctional city of San Berdoo, which basically has got no dough.
San Bernardino spends about 75 percent of its general-fund budget on salaries, benefits, and pensions, with the vast majority of those expenses coming from one class of employee: public-safety workers, meaning cops and firemen, who earn as much as $230,000 a year with overtime. Their pensions, as will not surprise anybody who has been paying attention to government finances in recent years, are extraordinarily generous. In 2007, a consulting firm warned the city that its budget was in trouble because its personnel costs were growing considerably more quickly than revenue, and the city’s response was . . . to offer even more generous pensions in the same year. The firemen are fat and happy in the California sunshine, but the rest of San Bernardino is not doing as well:
“When times were good, my wife and I didn’t go hog-wild and play the let’s-get-a-bigger-house game,” says Mike Potter, who works for a local construction firm. “But now times aren’t good. At my company, 50 percent of the employees have been laid off, and I’ve taken a 15 percent pay cut. I was the head of engineering, and now I’m also a part-time receptionist and janitor.” He is one of the lucky ones — the local unemployment rate runs around 15 percent — and he is blunt on the subject of what encumbers San Bernardino and other bankruptcy-bound California cities: “The public-employee unions are killing us. They are killing our cities, our states, and our country.”
Well, duh. Abbott and Costello explained all this for you years ago. So hear instruction and be wise:
All clear now? Good. Now get back to loafing.
60-70? Years later and they’re still funnier and more spot on than most comics today. And with no f-bombs.
rbj,
Having grown up with Black and White re-runs of their movies as Saturday morning staples, I have to agree….Even though Bud Abbot was a rather frightening character to me as a child, so stern and cruel it seemed…
Had to laugh when I read in latter years that the “straight” guys of a comedy duo most often were paid MORE than the “funny” guy, as it was a harder role to pull off and most performers would prefer to be “the good guy”.
Many years later had the unexpected pleasure of assisting in the erection of Mr.Costello’s statue in Patterson New Jersey.
Class and Talent never go out of STYLE, but they do seem to disappear, dont they?
Bud and Lou were okay, but Laurel and Hardy were the best of all time.
“The public-employee unions are killing us. They are killing our cities, our states, and our country.”
And what makes this even more insulting is that the unions just don’t care. They don’t care if they bankrupt a community. Where do these public sector union members think all this money is coming from, the sky? It comes from hard-working taxpayers, many of whom today do not even come close to getting the pay and benefits these union members get. And while many of these poor homeowners may be out of work or struggling, they are STILL expected to cough up the money to pay for these outrageous benefits. Where is Obama’s “fairness” now? Is it fair that hard-working middle class people should have their taxes increased again and again to pay for their neighbor’s benefits? And to add insult to injury, many of these unions simply refuse to take a cut in benefits, even though people in the private sector have to do that all the time.
No wonder people in even a liberal state like Wisconsin have had enough of unions. Scott Walker’s success proves that the unions CAN be beaten and in a big way. We should all be encouraged by that and demand that the public service union members live under the same rules that private sector employees have to work under. Now THAT would be fair.
“Where do these public sector union members think all this money is coming from, the sky?”
They know every dollar of “federal” funds that they always clamor for when local citizens are taxed to the breaking point comes from Debt to China.
But they dont care. They get paid in “real” money, we get stuck with the balloon payment in the end.
And thats not their problem…
Or, as my sons 103k a year, zero contribution to bennies, lifetime retirement at 90% of salary Public School teacher said to me during their recent STRIKE to obtain MORE:
“Dont complain to me about YOUR career choice…if you want to afford home in this area, you should have became a teacher”
Scott Walker is a conservative who had a conservative Senate to work with. Califormia has Governor Brown and a legislature that just approved a $100 Billion train to nowhere.
“No wonder people in even a liberal state like Wisconsin have had enough of unions. Scott Walker’s success proves that the unions CAN be beaten and in a big way.”
The only problem is that Walker’s changes to union rules and pensions EXEMPTED police and fire departments. In California, the cops and firefighters are apparently the biggest drain on the city treasuries…..
Yep. Those evil unions MADE those politicians agree to contracts that they now regret. They MADE those politicians hire their own idiot nephews and campaign contributors for public sector jobs. They MADE you voters keep re-electing those gullible and helpless town councilmen, county legislators and mayors who are so easily duped by the plumbers, janitors, street cleaners and garbage men who work for them. Yep. Let’s fire all the social workers, parole officers, drug counselors and employment trainers. Who needs them!?! Fire them all and watch the economy get better, right? Government employees don’t do anything that matters, like teach our kids or fix our streets. They don’t spend money in their communities. They don’t eat or buy cars or live in houses. What possible contribution could they be making to society? To heck with them and their fancy Toyota Camrys and Ford pickup trucks.
Let rich bankers and brokers keep the billions they pilfer from society each day. Let them avoid paying their fair share of taxes. That always produces the kind of society you can be proud of. Ask W. Didn’t he make everything perfect for everyone? Ask Herbert Hoover. Didn’t he have all the answers? Both of them loved the rich almost as much as the tea party and Grover’s grovelers do.
Yes those union workers for the cities and states and feds all do a job. The small problem is THERE IS NO MORE MONEY IN THE HANDS OF THE PEOPLE PAYING TAXES THAT PAY THE UNION WORKERS SALARIES.the pool is empty.Sooner than later the city,state and federal governments will be bankrupt. The feds are $14,600,000,000 in debt with another $100,000,000,000 in unfunded mandates.
Wasn’t it FDR who said put down your shovel, light up a Camel, and sit on your ass?
Nope. That was your mom.
The disparity between public pensions between municipalities and counties on one hand, and the state on the other are huge.
Cops in medium-sized cities are pulling in six-figure pay and benefits and correspondingly large pensions, while CHP officers and state non-safety workers take home modest 5 figure pay. If Calpers capped pension benefits and paid only the first $125,000 that would go a long way towards solving the sustainability problem.
Unrelated to pensions, but still telling: the city manager of Buena Park CA (pop 85,000) recently retired and got a check for $490,000 for unused sick and vacation time. The state caps accumulated leave at 400 hours, so again, your state worker can’t game the system the same way as local employees.
Gee, capped at just 400 hours!
Ten WEEKS of unused sick days accumulated?
Take a guess what the “cap” is at my (fortune 100) Private Sector company?
ZERO.
Thats right, zero. Use them or lose them.
We’ll cover some vaca days, everyone needs a break…sometimes you get sick, family things, whatever…sure thats expected, thats a “reasonable” thing…but you cant “bank” them year after year, and expect a cash pay-out (at your HIGHER salary?) for days you never took off dating to when you were a lower paid hew hire.
I offered them then, you apparently didnt need them.
So dont cry to me now, 10 years later, and say “But there were days in during the BUSH ADMINISTRATION that I COULD have taken off, but DIDNT…can you pay me for them NOW?”
Because thats bullshit.
“Paid for nothing” public union schemes with unused sick days is a criminal event that should result in jail time.
No work, no pay.
I hate class warfare and think it is a dangerous weapon. It’s based on envy and that is a dangerous emotion to unleash. That having been said, I’m starting to think that we should pay the Democrats back in kind by using it against them and their priveleged public employees. There are still a whole hell of a lot more of us than there are of them – meaning government employees. Why the hell should we not begrudge them of their comforts – in the same way their patrons, the Democrats, begrudge and attack us.
It was an arguably acceptable arrangement back in the day when the norm was that you made less as a govenrment employee but were compensated by having a ‘secure’ job. That paradigm is laughable today with the greater than private sector salaries combined with lifetime tenure and guaranteed pensions. They have become in effect a new ruling class, an American Nomenklatura. And we need to take that away from them. I want to get the hoi polloi out on the streets with pitchforks and torches and turn them on these party apparatchiks and take their s**t away. Because of fairness and all that. And because, just SHUT UP.
I’d love to see that shoe on the other foot.
You’ve all forgotten the second half of O8blarney’s comments on how well the private sector os doing:
“The private sector is doing fine. Where we’re seeing weaknesses in our economy have to do with state and local government.”
Yup. He’s got his finger on the Economy’s absent pulse.
That skit looks like the average press conference with the highest paid stand up comedian in the U.S.A.
Abbott and Costello were true professionals; More so than anyone in government today.
Today’s politician thinks they are sharp minded. Abbott and Costello could talk circles around todays politician before they even knew they were involved in a conversation.
” New School liberal
Yep. Those evil unions MADE those politicians agree to contracts that they now regret. They MADE those politicians hire their own idiot nephews and campaign contributors for public sector jobs. They MADE you voters keep re-electing those gullible and helpless town councilmen, county legislators and mayors who are so easily duped by the plumbers, janitors, street cleaners and garbage men who work for them.”
No, NSL, they paid them. With union dues. Paid directly to the unions by the gummint, and recycled into the pol’s election and re-election campaigns. This is the main reason the AFSCME and SEIU hate Scott Walker. He cut off pipe-lining union dues to the government unions.
How can I start trying and become a better person who is helpful to others and good at things?