Austerity Protest Fever

A labour objector, protesting against the state government in Wisconsin attempting to deal with the large and mounting deficit posed himself on a ledge off the capital building in Madison. Threatening to jump in support of his impassioned position on the sanctity of labour contracts. People defending their turf, unwilling to give up anything in favour of the larger perspective of balancing the state's financial books.

As though a page was hastily torn out of recent history, emulating the frustrated agitation of the young Tunisian fruit-seller Mohamed Bouazizi, whose self-immolation sparked an ever-growing protest in North Africa and the Middle East autocratic governments; against heartless bureaucratic interference in free enterprise.

Or, as though Americans were closely watching the violence of the belt-tightening protests in Greece.

However they have been inspired, American trade unionists will not stand for austerity measures hitting and belittling their entitlements. Even though, in the face of reasonable accommodation, those entitlements far surpass the wages and incidental entitlements - through successful union bargaining - that most Americans, particularly obviously, the unemployed can count on.

A recent poll showed, rather surprisingly, that most Americans - despite their straitened circumstances and the still-struggling economy that is wresting itself out of a deep depression, albeit with remaining high unemployment figures - support union collective bargaining entitlements. After all, the state succumbed to the rigorous bargaining set forth by the unions.

Except that the cumulative effects of all those weak-kneed legislators agreeing to some really exceptionally unworkable perquisites turned out to be unworkable. In that the state, even in good times, found it increasingly difficult to maintain contracts that had salaried workers paying little-to-nothing for their own medical and retirement plans.

It is also surprising to hear of the poll results, given that in the country many of the states pride themselves on being "right to work" states. Which, translated, means low-wage, non-unionized states, where union busting is a state sport, and workers take the jobs that are available and lump it, sans benefits.

President Barack Obama is squarely on the side of the unions, in a growing fever of blow-back across state lines. He would be, as a liberal-minded president, concerned with the state of his country's lower and middle classes, the working poor to the working entitled. Besides which, during his run for the presidency he had huge union support.

He could hardly now, in their time of need, desert those who had so enthusiastically supported him. And he has not. In his speeches while making note of the dire economic times and the circumstances that have impacted so deleteriously on state finances, the federal government has not been exempt from the same pressures.

"I don't think it does anybody any good when public employees are denigrated or vilified or their rights are infringed upon. We need to attract the best and brightest to public service. These times demand it", he emphasized in a televised address. But these times also demand stringent actions to tame the runaway deficit and resulting debt.

And it is not outside the realm of reasonability that the governor of Wisconsin has sought to have state government workers take on some of the responsibility for their own health care and pension benefits to more closely resemble a balanced picture. Limiting collective bargaining rights for most public employees represents a step back in time.

It's those who bargain with them who need a little more backbone. The need to do so should cut across party lines. The Democratic legislators who fled across state lines to stall the inevitable are only imperilling the financial fortunes of the state, aside from behaving in a childish, even illegitimate manner to protest what they hadn't the guts to pull off.

Clearly, the President of the United States is not prepared to pick up a picket sign and join the union protest. He took his own necessary steps not all that long ago. He recognized the need to reign in costs to the taxpayer in light of the fact that the taxpayer is already groaning under an unsupportable burden. Aside from the fact of huge unemployment.

"I recently froze the salaries of federal employees for two years. It wasn't something I wanted to do, but I did it because of the very tough fiscal situation we are in. I believe that everybody should be prepared to give up something in order to solve our budget challenges. I think most public servants agree with that. Democrats and Republicans agree with that."

But do they? Does he?

Photo: Ray Cunningham