Posts Tagged ‘unions’
Wednesday, May 14th, 2014
Time for another Texas vs. California roundup:
Chief Executive ranks the states for business friendliness. Once again, Texas is ranked the best state for doing business in. And once again, California is ranked the worst.
“Texas is the best state for business and I don’t see anything to slow TX down. The education and quality of eligible employees is excellent right now. Business is booming and growing quicker and more rapidly in 2014 than any other year. It’s an exciting time in Texas.”
“California goes out of its way to be anti-business and particularly where one might put manufacturing and/or distribution operations.”
“California continues to lead in disincentives for growth businesses to stay.”
“California’s attitude toward business makes you question why anyone would build a business there.”
“California could hardly do more to discourage business if that was the goal. The regulatory, tax and political environment are crushing.”
California Governor Jerry Brown unveils a budget that takes baby steps toward actual pension and budget reform. Naturally Brown’s fellow Democrats in the state legislature are fighting him every step of the way.
Texas vs. California? Try Houston vs. California:
California state rep thinks the minimum wage in the state should be $26 an hour. I agree, especially if they call it the “Let’s Drive All Remaining Business to Texas Act”…
When he was a San Diego City Councilman, California Democrat Congressman Scott Peters not only underfunded the city’s pension plan while hiking benefits, he indemnified the pension board for doing so.
More on Peters, via an attack ad:
“A new analysis of California’s independent public retirement systems suggests they are more woefully underfunded than they appear, and that Los Angeles County is among the worst of all.”
Bankrupt Stockton’s last remaining big creditor refuses to take 1¢ on the dollar for debts the city owes. (Remember: State pension fund CalPERS didn’t take any haircut at all.)
In bankrupt San Bernardino, talks between the city and CalPERS are making the federal judge overseeing the case impatient.
Chuck DeVore on why Texans trust their state government more than most:
Then factors that appear to explain from 13 percent to 30 percent of the differences in trust among the states: rate of union membership,with more trust in states with lower union membership; state’s level of soft tyranny, a measure of the power of state government over its people; percentage of state and local taxes as a share of income, with lower taxes leading to more trust; the right to keep and bear arms, with citizens trusting a government that trusts them to defend themselves; a business-friendly lawsuit climate; the days the legislature is in session, with less trust as the legislature approaches full-time; and the average commute time, with less time spent in traffic leading to more trust.
Lastly, a combination of from two to four of the previous factors correlates to 34 to 41 percent of the trust in each state with a mix of four: taxes, gun rights, lawsuit reform and commute time, showing the highest link to trust. Comparatively speaking, Texas lawmakers have done well in these four areas of public policy.
When building trust in state government, enacting liberty-minded legislation is a good place to start.
But it isn’t all sunshine in Texas Local debt continues to rise, though Eanes School District voters finally decide that they’ve had enough and defeat a bond proposal.
Tags:Budget, California, CalPERs, Chuck DeVore, Democrats, Jerry Brown, pension crisis, Regulation, San Bernardino, Scott Peters, Stockton, Texas, unions, video
Posted in Budget, Democrats, Regulation, Texas, unions, video, Waste and Fraud | No Comments »
Tuesday, April 29th, 2014
Big news, as one of the world’s largest car makers decides to abandon tax-and-spend California for the Lone Star State:
Toyota is moving U.S. sales and marketing operations from Torrence, California to Plano, Texas.
California has become infamous with business executives and owners there not only for high tax rates and complex taxing schemes but also for overzealous regulations and regulators that have managed to stifle the entrepreneurial energy of thousands of companies.
“Criminal activity is the extreme manifestation of California’s institutionalized progressive hypocrisy.”
ZeroHedge (quoting a certain gun-grabbers business news service) offers up the most and least taxing states in America. Once again, California tops the list for most taxing. Plus a handy visual representation:
“California doesn’t just have the highest state income tax in the nation. It leads the rest of the country in almost every category of taxation: the highest state sales tax, the highest taxes on gasoline at the pump, and the highest corporate tax west of the Mississippi. And the taxes aren’t doing much for the people of the state, rich or poor. For the first time in history, the Census Bureau reports that California is also the poorest state in the nation, with 23.8% of the population living in poverty, in large part because of California’s high cost of living (which is not helped by all the sky-high consumption taxes the Democrats have enacted and the poor must pay to survive.)”
If that weren’t bad enough, a new bill (SB 1372) threatens to levy a class-war tax on CEO salaries. “Their bill would change the state’s fixed tax rate on publicly traded corporations to a sliding levy that’s pegged to the earnings gap between the top-paid executive and the median worker.” Evidently Democrats want all publicly traded corporations in California to move their headquarters to Texas…
The Pension Tsunami is going to wreck California sooner rather than later. “State and local governments in the Golden State have underfunded their golden-parachute pension promises by a terrifying half a trillion dollars. Twenty thousand public employees now collect yearly pensions of $100,000 or more.”
Some of the money those “public servants” are raking in is pretty staggering: “In 2012, more than 100 individuals took home more than $500,000 in total compensation; 8,248 raked in more than $250,000; 28,844 cashed in to the tune of $200,000 or more.”
Superintendent in a California school district who oversees 6,600 students pulled down a cool $674,559 last year. (Hat tip: Dwight.)
Evidently CalPERS and San Bernardino are still negotiating.
If you think CalPERS is going broke now, just wait to California’s bankrupt cities start writing down debts owed.
Everyone knows San Francisco is as liberal as liberal can be. Yet even there voters have voted down green energy mandates.
California hot sauce maker Sriracha is still mulling relocation offers. Texas is still a possibility.
California’s tax bureaucracy will continue suing you after 20 years, even if they’ve lost in court.
Poll of residents shows that Texas is one of the five most popular states to live in. “Texans rank high on standard of living and trust in their state government, and they are less negative than others are about the state taxes they pay.”
Texas isn’t immune from California’s troubles when big city officials start spending like California Democrats. Big-spending Texas cities should learn from bankrupt Detroit’s example.
Tags:California, CalPERs, San Bernardino, San Francisco, Sriracha, Texas, Toyota, unions, Welfare State
Posted in Budget, Democrats, Texas, unions, Waste and Fraud, Welfare State | 1 Comment »
Tuesday, April 15th, 2014
Today sucks if you still have to finish your taxes. It sucks more in California than Texas, since you have to pay state income taxes as well. That includes a marginal tax rate of 9.3% for all those millionaires making more than $49,774 a year. As opposed to Texas’ marginal rate of 0.0% for all…
Rich Californians don’t seem to mind that their green fantasies are screwing the poor.
California Democrats are trying to write racial quotas into the state Constitution. Oddly enough, Asian Americans are actually objecting to their children getting screwed out of college admissions. (Hat tip: Instapundit.)
“A combination of unfriendly tax policies, military budget cuts and cutthroat competition is wreaking havoc on California’s storied aerospace industry, a new study cautions.” More here, which notes that:
Texas and Washington offer low corporate income tax and no personal income tax, while providing a stable business climate and skilled work force. Many high-profile corporations have relocated their operations to new states. Recent examples include Northrop Grumman, which moved its headquarters to Northern Virginia; Raytheon Space and Airborne Systems, which moved its headquarters to McKinney, Texas; and Boeing, which moved two aircraft modernization programs, for the C-130 Hercules military transport aircraft and the B-1 bomber, from Long Beach to Oklahoma City.
CalPERS latest report proves conclusively that the fund spontaneously generates unicorns, rainbows and jobs. The Wall Street Journal examines the claims, wipes the vaguely yellow liquid off their legs and concludes “This political report offers one more reason why taxpayers and public workers shouldn’t trust Calpers with their money and would be better served by defined-contribution retirement plans that employees own and control.”
The California State Teachers’ Retirement System announced it faces $73.7 billion in long-term liabilities. “CalSTRS has a $71 billion unfunded pension liability.”
Both CalPERS and CalSTARS are desperately in need of reform.
The state teacher pension fund, CalSTRS, needs an extra $4.5 billion each year for 30 years to pay off its unfunded liabilities. CalPERS’ local government members will see costs increase by 50 percent during the next six years. And the state needs to contribute $1 billion more per year for retiree health care benefits.
These obligations for benefits already earned must be paid, and over the next decade, they will continue to drain funding from essential services such as education, public safety, transportation and health care.
Yet, powerful interests remain all too eager to kick the can down the road and push our pension problems onto future generations.
Why California has an affordable housing crisis.
Is there a way out of Taxifornia? As such a solution would require liberals to stop acting like liberals, the answer is: probably not.
Bell’s corrupt officials agree to plea bargain deal. Bonus: Robert “Ratso” Rizzo gets 33 months on federal tax evasion charges. (Hat tip: Dwight, who has been all over the Bell story.)
At least 60 companies have relocated from California to Texas. But Elk Grove, California is striking back, trying to lure Texas companies to California. “The slogan: ‘Don’t wait for high taxes and stifling regulation to come to you, end the suspense and move to California’ just doesn’t seem too appealing to me.”
Continuing troubles with California’s high speed rail boondoggle.
Sports equipment maker MonkeySports is relocating from Corona, California to Allen, Texas, adding up to some 225 Texas jobs over two years.
A closer look at relocations to the Austin area.
Tags:Bell, Budget, California, Crime, Economics, fraud, Taxes, Texas, unions, Welfare State
Posted in Budget, Economics, Regulation, Texas, unions, Waste and Fraud, Welfare State | No Comments »
Monday, March 24th, 2014
In California, I would say that March Madness is ignoring the looming pension crisis, except that madness extends to every other month as well…
Where is income inequality worst in the U.S.? Well, for one thing, in California:
Perhaps no place is inequality more evident than in the rural reaches of California, the nation’s richest agricultural state. The Golden State is now home to 111 billionaires, by far the most of any state; California billionaires personally hold assets worth $485 billion, more than the entire GDP of all but 24 countries in the world. Yet the state also suffers the highest poverty rate in the country (adjusted for housing costs), above 23%, and a leviathan welfare state. As of 2012, with roughly 12% of the population, California accounted for roughly one-third of the nation’s welfare recipients.
With the farm economy increasingly mechanized and industrial growth stifled largely by regulation, many rural Californians particularly Latinos, are downwardly mobile, and doing worse than their parents; native-born Latinos actually have shorter lifespans than their parents, according to a 2011 report. Although unemployment remains high in many of the state’s largest urban counties, the highest unemployment is concentrated in the rural counties of the interior. Fresno was found in one study to have the least well-off Congressional district.
The vast expanse of economic decline in the midst of unprecedented, but very narrow urban luxury has been characterized as “liberal apartheid.” The well-heeled, largely white and Asian coastal denizens live in an economically inaccessible bubble insulated from the largely poor, working-class, heavily Latino communities in the eastern interior of the state.
The Myth of the California Renaissance:
California also has the nation’s highest poverty rate and the most food stamp recipients, and policymakers have done little to address profligate spending, unfunded pensions, and ever-growing retiree health-care obligations.”
Inland California, from Imperial in the south to Modoc in the north, remains one of the poorest regions in the nation. Though the state unemployment rate fell in February to 8.1 percent, inland unemployment ranges from 9.5 percent in Riverside to 25.9 percent in Colusa. Of the 20 counties in the United States with the largest unemployment rates, 11 are in California.
California only has the second highest taxes in the nation! Thank God for New York!
Unfavorable ballot language stymies a California pension reform effort…
…but pension reform advocates are regrouping to make another push in 2016.
Indeed, pension reform will be the biggest issue for southern California voters this fall.
More on how government at the state and national level is destroying California agriculture in the name of protecting the Delta Smelt.
There’s speculation that California Governor Jerry Brown actually wants to see the illegal, underfunded, and ill-fated “bullet train to nowhere” die, he just doesn’t want to get the blame for killing it.
How Texas job growth has outpaced both the nation and California.
Occidental Petroleum is moving its headquarters to Houston and spinning off its California operations as a separate company.
Rick Perry raids again.
Telecom company Channell Commercial is relocating from Temecula, California to Rockwell, Texas. “Blaming California for an oppressive business climate for manufacturing growth, Channell said the costs to do business here have made expansion in this state no longer feasible.”
And I missed this story from last year on Chevron building a 50 story office building in Houston. That could mean the days of their California headquarters are numbered…
Tags:California, Channell Commercial, Chevron, environmentalism, fraud, Jerry Brown, Occidental Petroleum, Rick Perry, Texas, unions, waste, Welfare State
Posted in Regulation, Texas, unions, Waste and Fraud, Welfare State | No Comments »
Thursday, March 13th, 2014
Time for another roundup of Texas vs. California:
Texas surpasses California as the top tech exporter.
Victor Davis Hanson wants to “save” California by making liberals eat their own dogfood.
Texas is creating jobs at all income levels.
Vallejo still can’t afford its pensions:
The California city of Vallejo emerged from bankruptcy just over two years ago, but it is still struggling to pay its bills.
The main culprit: Ballooning pension costs, which will hit more than $14 million this year, a nearly 40% increase from two years ago.
Amid threats of legal action from the state’s pension giant, CalPERS, Vallejo did little during its nearly three-year stint in bankruptcy to stem the growth in its pension bills.
Rising CalPERS pension costs are also threatening Long Beach’s financial stability.
Berkeley is looking a little better for the short term, but after that they too will be feeling the CalPERS squeeze.
Pacific Grove is having a referendum to roll back pension increases.
California is getting ready to hike gas taxes again, adding another 12¢ a gallon to gas prices.
Is there a Democrat-on-Democrat battle over unions brewing in California?
California nursing home chain files for bankruptcy. “The dagger in the heart is that we have been overwhelmed by a wave of class-action lawsuits.”
A list of former Los Angeles city employees earning six figure pensions. (Hat tip: Pension Tsunami.)
California rancher’s are selling their cattle to Texas ranchers due to drought.
Cagney Global Logistics relocates from Denver to Irving, Texas.
San Jose-based sheet metal manufacturer Cortec is expanding in Pflugerville.
Even punk rock queen Exene Cervenka is getting out of California while the getting is good:
Now when I think about California, I think of a liberal oppressive police state and regulations and taxes and fees. I’d rather go someplace and have my own little place out on the edge of town. I’m a country girl at heart. It makes me happy when I see people in Texas open-carrying. It makes me feel safe. I’m not even a gun owner, but I’d like to see a gun rack in every pickup truck, like my boyfriend had when I was fifteen years old in Florida. An armed society is a polite society.
No End In Sight for Texas Oil Boom.
Tags:bankruptcy, Berkeley, Budget, California, CalPERs, Exene Cervenka, Long Beach, oil industry, Pacific Grove, pension crisis, Texas, unions, Vallejo, Vict, Victor Davis Hanson
Posted in Budget, Democrats, Texas, unions | No Comments »
Wednesday, March 12th, 2014
Republican David Jolly beat Democrat Alex Sink in a special election for Florida’s 13th congressional district. CD13 is a swing district that voted narrowly for Obama in the last two Presidential elections.
One district does not an election make, but a close look at the tea leaves suggests that the outlook for Democrats in 2014 is looking very dim, thanks to the albatross that is ObamaCare:
DNC was hoping Sink’s campaign would be “a blueprint to display public support for Obamacare”. Oh, I think it did a mighty fine job of showing how much the public supports ObamaCare…
The Tampa Tribune says that “David Jolly’s victory Tuesday in the U.S. House District 13 special election represents a clear repudiation of Obamacare.”
Even the Washington Post says Jolly’s win “illustrated the political toxicity of the law known as Obamacare.”
Well, guess what? seven competitive Senate seats are in states more heavily Republican than the district Jolly just won.
you know what’s less Democrat-friendly territory than this R+1 swing district? The states of West Virginia (R+13), North Carolina (R+3), Louisiana (R+12), South Dakota (R+10), Alaska (R+12). Arkansas (R+14) and Montana (R+7). Those are all currently Democrat-held seats. And there are seven of them.
If last night’s result means that a halfway decent Republican candidate can win on Republican-leaning territory by hammering away at Obamacare… then the odds of the GOP winning the Senate look very, very good.
The message of Sink’s defeat for Democrats? “‘Be afraid. Be very afraid.”
All this may be one reason Sean Trende now gives Republicans an 80% chance to win the Senate.
Of course, Trende also wrote not to read too much into the Florida CD13 special election. But he also thought Sink would probably win…
Meanwhile, a service workers union is talking about going on strike due to health care contract changes resulting from ObamaCare:
Culinary members have long enjoyed health care that is fully funded by employers, but the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act has increased medical costs to the point that many companies can no longer afford to pay full freight. The hotels want workers to pick up some of Obamacare’s new costs, a demand the Culinary won’t agree to.
Of course, Obamacare is the law because of the Culinary’s political activism. The Culinary and the rest of organized labor poured untold millions of dollars and thousands of volunteer hours into the election campaigns of President Barack Obama and the Democrats who wrote and passed Obamacare, and the unions championed the reboot of American health insurance.
Then they realized Obamacare’s critics were right. The law is wrecking platinum-plated union health plans, not to mention health insurance for tens of millions of people.
Unions opposing Obamacare, Hispanics opposing unlimited abortion; that Democrat coalition is started to look more than a little frayed…
Tags:2014 Election, abortion, Alex Sink, David Jolly, Democrats, Elections, Florida, Hispanics, ObamaCare, unions
Posted in Democrats, Elections, ObamaCare, unions | 1 Comment »
Tuesday, February 25th, 2014
Another roundup of tab-clearing news, much of which got pushed aside by Ukraine updates:
Obama Administration admits that ObamaCare will screw small businesses. (Hat tip: Instapundit.) Why are any Republicans futzing around with any fix but full repeal?
Bobby Jindal: “Obamacare is giving low-income Americans fewer reasons to work.”
How ObamaCare is turning into the Democrats’ own forever war.
Two more congressional Democrats retire.
And that doesn’t count liberal Democratic fossil John Dingell, who’s also retiring after a mere 58 years in office.
And speaking of Michigan Democratic congressman, here’s how Rep. Gary Peters is trying to kill a woman with cancer:
Democrats in denial over ObamaCare unpopularity. Well, those who haven’t retired yet…
How unions and Democratic cronies looted Detroit’s pension plans.
Former Democratic congressman and convicted statutory rapist Mel Reynolds arrested on child pornography charges in Zimbabwe. (You might remember that Bill Clinton pardoned him on the way out the door…)
Deeply incompetent New Orleans Democratic Mayor Ray “Chocolate City” Nagin convicted on 20 federal corruption counts.
NJ’s Democratic Rep. Rob Andrews: The Washington Generals of Legislators.
The top special interest donors contribute to Democrats.
This week in the Democratic Liberal Media Complex Revolving Door.
There are few people liberals hate more than conservative black men.
Ted Cruz is winning.
Food prices continue to soar, yet another sign that inflation figures are significantly understated.
Record numbers of college graduates are living with their parents. Thanks, Obama!
“*Somebody* at Cover Oregon will end up going to jail.”
“The combination of UAW micromanagement and adversarial culture, not wages per se, is what helped to do in GM.”
“The UAW couldn’t even win an election it had been handed on a silver platter by management.”
Venezuela continues to stumble along at a repressive simmer.
Too bad they’re out of toilet paper.
Catholic priest in Venezuela beaten unconscious by socialist state thugs.
Michael Totten points out that Che Guevara is a murderous communist scumbag. Bonus: “Cuba’s maximum wage is less than one percent of America’s minimum wage”
Battle is joined between EUroskeptic UKIP and the EUrophilic Liberal-Democrats.
John Kerry: There’s no room in the religion of global warming for cost-benefit analysis.
UK Leftists want punitive taxes even if they bring in no additional revenue.
Detroit home-owner with an AR pattern rifle 3, stupid thugs trying to break into her home 0.
Portugal decriminalized all drugs 11 years ago. Result? Addiction cut in half, and “Portugal’s drug usage rates are now among the lowest of EU member states.”
“Diversity demands that diversity of opinion not be tolerated anymore.”
“Anti-male misandry, like anti-female #misogyny, is unjust and dangerous.”
Paying attention to the victimhood identity politics crowd, or how to murder your writing career.
Sarah Hoyt further dissects Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America idiocy. She touches on many of the reasons I didn’t renew my membership, the main ones being that SFWA is no longer important enough to be worth fighting for, and was certainly not worth $90 a year in dues.
“Human Resources has been very reluctant to respond to my complaints about being invisibly strangled by a cyborg space wizard.”
One more Tweet:
Tags:Anthropogenic Global Warming, Bill Clinton, Bobby Jindal, Communism, Crime, Democrats, Detroit, Gary Peters, Guns, inflation, John Dingell, John Kerry, LinkSwarm, Media Watch, Mel Reynolds, Michigan, New Orleans, ObamaCare, SFWA, Ted Cruz, UAW, unions, video, Welfare State
Posted in Communism, Crime, Democrats, Global Warming, Media Watch, ObamaCare, unions, video, Waste and Fraud, Welfare State | No Comments »
Monday, February 17th, 2014
Friday workers at Volkswagen’s Chattanooga assembly plant rejected a UAW attempt to unionize them.
“If the union can’t win [in Chattanooga], it can’t win anywhere.”
The defeat is especially devastating for UAW because they had German-owned Volkswagen’s blessing to organize the plant, and regarded this as their best chance to unionize a southern automotive plant:
This wasn’t merely one more failed union organizing attempt. The UAW and its chief Bob King spent years working toward this vote as part of its strategy to organize plants in the American South, and all the stars were aligned in its favor.
Mr. King colluded with IG Metall, Volkswagen’s German union, to neutralize Volkswagen management. It pitched the collaborative vision of a labor-management “works council” at the plant that makes the VW Passat, and it claimed to have learned its lesson from the confrontation and strikes that hurt Detroit’s auto makers. Volkswagen management gave the union the run of the plant to lobby workers while denying similar privileges to union opponents.
So it’s nothing short of remarkable that the union couldn’t make the sale. The failure reflects how well the plant’s workers are doing without a union, to the tune of $27 an hour including benefits. The defeat also speaks to the harm the UAW has done to itself by driving GM and Chrysler to bankruptcy and pushing companies like Caterpillar to move new production from union plants.
Reports make it appear that unionized workers would actually end up taking $3 an hour less home after union dues were deducted. Gee, who could possibly turn down such a bounty?
Said one worker: “‘Look at every company that’s went bankrupt or shut down or had an issue,’ he said. ‘What is the one common denominator with all those companies? UAW. We don’t need it.'”
More from the Wall Street journal editorial:
But the fact that unions must rely on brute government force shows how out of touch they are with modern economic reality. American manufacturing is making a modest comeback with the help of rising labor costs in China and the American energy revolution. But it could stage an even bigger revival without the threat that unions could once again make American production uncompetitive. The last thing the U.S. economy needs is to import European labor practices. In Chattanooga, and not for the first time, the workers are smarter than management.
The results also shows why “card check” is bunk.
For all the talk of “Republican interference” (local Tennessee elected officials like Senator Bob Corker opposed the unionization), little mention has been made of President Obama’s sticky fingers.
It also ignores the grassroots efforts of plant workers themselves to stave off unionization, for many good reasons:
We are already among the highest paid in the region and, when compared to UAW-represented employees at the Detroit Three with the same length of service, VW Team Members make more.
The UAW is increasing union dues by 25% to fund a strike against Detroit automakers. The UAW will use our money to fund their strike after years of irresponsible spending (e.g., the UAW golf course and Las Vegas conventions). Remember, about half of the money you pay to the UAW will be sent directly to the union in Detroit.
The UAW wanted to unionize us without an election. When that failed, behind closed doors, they got VW to agree to a 9-day “ambush” election, giving UAW organizers dispatched from Detroit access to our plant.
And a defeat for unions is a defeat for the Democratic Party:
Unions are the single biggest source of funds for Democratic causes and candidates.
According to Opensecrets.org, of the top ten political donors in the last 25 years, six are unions. And they all overwhelmingly donated to Democratic causes and candidates. The UAW, for instance, has donated $41.7 million over the last 25 years. That’s well over twice what the infamous Koch brothers have donated, mostly to Republican causes. (The Koch brothers actually gave 8 percent of their money to Democratic causes and candidates.)
Of the UAW’s donations, 71 percent went to Democrats and zero percent went to Republicans. The other 29 percent went to organizations not formally affiliated with either party but it’s a safe bet they are left-leaning. Unions can also mobilize large numbers of “volunteers” for phone banks and get-out-the-vote efforts.
Thus, unions have such a disproportionate influence over the Democratic Party for the simplest of reasons: they buy it. How much longer that will continue is a good question. There is no reason to think that the long-term decline in the private sector will not continue. And in places where union dues are no longer collected by governments (such as in Wisconsin), public sector union members have been leaving in droves. Obviously, they don’t think they have been getting value for their money. That is also a trend that is likely to spread.
Here’s an analysis from the enemy camp of five things the UAW did wrong.
A few Tweets:
And just in case you don’t get that last reference…
Tags:Bob Corker, cars, Democrats, Tennessee, UAW, unions, Volkswagen
Posted in Democrats, unions | No Comments »
Tuesday, February 11th, 2014
Meant to put this up at lunch, but Stuff. And Things.
How California overprotects public employee union contracts. If the paper from Volokh the Younger is too heavy-sledding for non-lawyers, here’s a nice summary.
CalPERS is demographically doomed.
The people of San Bernardino vote all the bums out. “After Tuesday night, six of seven council members are now on record as saying they want to explore reducing San Bernardino’s pensions, along with [Carey] Davis, the new mayor, and a new city attorney, Gary Saenz.”
Another California city, Placentia, drifts toward bakruptcy. “Placentia has been papering over a structural $1.5 million deficit in its $30 million budget for at least five years, plugging the hole with lucky money (more soberly called ‘one-time revenues’).”
Stockton: Hey, we’re in bankruptcy! I guess that means we can just kill our shelter animals willy nilly. Federal judge: Not so fast.
Los Angeles firefighter compensation averages $218,000 an employee. (Hat tip: Pension Tsunami.).
Are even California’s Democratic legislators waking up to the problem?
California university workers plan a strike. See, no matter how broke you are, unions still want wage hikes…
Unions want to ensure that Bob Filner’s closest ally is elected Mayor of San Diego to keep their gravy train coming…
Union membership in California is down to 16.4% of the workforce.
Jerry Brown: Hey, Supreme Court, reverse that high speed rail decision! High Speed Rail Contractor: Thanks, Jer! Here’s $27,000.
Websense is relocating from San Diego to Austin. Dropbox is also moving additional jobs to Austin.
Charles Schuab is relocating jobs from San Francisco to Texas.
California industrial brush company relocates to Utah.
The Texas labor force keeps growing.
Tags:Austin, Bob Filner, California, fraud, Jerry Brown, Los Angeles, Placentia, San Bernardino, San Diego, Stockton, Texas, unions, waste, Welfare State
Posted in Austin, Regulation, Texas, unions, Waste and Fraud, Welfare State | No Comments »
Friday, January 17th, 2014
Welcome to your complimentary Friday LinkSwarm. I steal collect these from all over, including Ace of Spades HQ, Instapundit, Twitter, Facebook, and a dozen other places
Really, is there any book that screams “love story” like George Orwell’s 1984?
Reminder: North Korea is still an unmitigated communist hellhole. Not that anyone whose name isn’t Dennis Rodman has forgotten…
More people in Illinois sign up for concealed carry than ObamaCare. That’s so delicious I might have to rerun it for the next ObamaCare and gun news roundups…
Insurers say they’re just fine and dandy with ObamaCare subsidies.
ObamaCare cast pall of gloom over Democratic attempts to take the House. Now if only I could figure out where I placed my nanoscale violin…
Jonah Goldberg further explores the theme:
In 2009, retiring Arkansas representative Marion Berry presciently warned that Obamacare was setting up the Democrats for a huge defeat in the 2010 midterms, just like “Hillarycare” had led to a loss of 54 House seats in 1994. Obama scoffed at such concerns. According to Berry, the president told him, “Well, the big difference here and in ’94 was you’ve got me.” Republicans went on to win 63 House seats and six Senate seats. It was the largest swing in the House since 1938. So I guess the difference was him.
Liberal New York Times editor wonders why cancer patients can’t just hurry up and die.
Retiring congressman Jim Moran: Scumbag.
Compared to the Obama Administration, Chris Christie is a rank amateur in the vindictiveness Olympics.
“If the current president is making a mess of everything and almost no one is being held accountable, isn’t that a bigger story?”
Every so often. the New York Times publishes a lifestyle story whose entire purpose seems to be to make you hate New Yorkers. Today’s example Left-wing yuppie tells how capitalism (in the form of her failing business) made her start stealing stuff.
Obama tells Senate Democrats that he’s going to make John Boehner his bitch on illegal alien amnesty.
Ted Cruz is America’s most efficient Senator, while Rand Paul ties for most effective.
Calling all Jews, calling all Jews. Calling all Jews, calling all Jews. (Via Ace)
It occurs to me that people younger or older than a certain edge (“My lawn! Off it!”) may have no idea what I’m riffing on, so here’s the reference:
100,000 government employees escape union control.
Obama (wait for it) gives a speech, claiming that the solution is (wait for it) bigger government. (Save this sentence, and you’ll find that you can use it over and over again the next three years…)
Michael Totten on Syria: “Today we have a near-zero chance of a non-horrible outcome.”
How the American Studies Association anti-Israel boycott breaks the law.
Baltic Dry Index collapsing?
I think I know what the next Alamo Draft House “don’t talk on your cell in the theater” ad will be.
Liberal actually says that the Obama Administration has no serious scandals. It’s like that Monty Python skit where the British naval officer is denying cannibalism while the guy next to him is munching on a human leg.
I am heartened to see that not a single commenter supports his absurdist whitewash.
Is Egypt getting ready to take the wood to Hamas?
German children taken from parents because they might be exposed to incorrect thought. Nazi Germany? Communist East Germany? Try today.
“Socialism is the anti-Semitism of intellectuals.”
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