Pensions Threatened in Attacks on Public Service Workers

By now, most AFSCME members know that public service workers and retirees are under attack across the country. We’ve become the scapegoats for a band of recently-elected governors who don’t like unions and have contempt for government workers.

By now, most AFSCME members know that public service workers and retirees are under attack across the country. We’ve become the scapegoats for a band of recently-elected governors who don’t like unions and have contempt for government workers. For them, state budget shortfalls are a convenient excuse to cut wages, benefits and jobs and bring us to our knees. 

War in Wisconsin

A prime example is Gov. Scott Walker (R) of Wisconsin – the state where AFSCME was founded in 1934. In February and March, Walker declared war on the teachers unions and AFSCME by trying to overturn Wisconsin’s 1959 law that guarantees collective bargaining rights for public employees. At the same time, he demanded more money from workers’ paychecks for pensions and health benefits.Ironically, while Walker was attacking public service workers for being a drain on the state budget, he was also cutting taxes for corporations. “That’s why we’re certain the governor’s actions were politically motivated, not dictated by fiscal concerns,” said International President Gerald W. McEntee. “Walker wants to destroy unions so he can eliminate the strongest opponents of wage andbenefit cuts and the defenders of public services.”

Providing more proof is the fact that, from the start, our members agreed to contribute more for their benefits – the equivalent of an 8 percent pay cut. It was a good faith effort to help reduce the state deficit. But our members drew the line at ending collective bargaining and destroying the union’s ability to negotiate for future wages, benefits and working conditions. 

Middle Class Assault

In the state Legislature, Walker had the support of big Republican majorities in both chambers, whose members seemed surprised to see thousands marching on the state Capitol – day after day – to protest the governor’s actions. The huge response came not only from union members, but from friends and neighbors as well, who recognized that the threat to workers’ rights was really an assault on the middle class.

Unfortunately, the governor won the first round when the Republican-controlled Legislature rammed through his bill to end collective bargaining in Wisconsin. But AFSCME is fighting back hard, starting with an effort to recall the state senators who helped the governor do his dirty work.

Similar fights are shaping up in other locations. In all, over 700 bills that attack public employees have been introduced in dozens of states. For example, with the backing of the Ohio Legislature’s solid Republican majority, Gov. John Kasich (R) recently signed a bill to end collective bargaining. But Ohio workers aren’t taking it lying down. Encouraged by public support, AFSCME and other unions are considering ways to counterpunch, including a statewide public referendum this fall to restore workers’ rights. 

Ohio Pension "Reform"

But Kasich is attacking pensions, too, and hopes to sign a pension “reform” bill this summer. To start, he wants to reduce the employer contribution by two percent and increase the worker contribution by the same. The legislation would also cut the annual COLA, raise the retirement age and lower initial benefits by changing the formula.

Michigan is another state where AFSCME has a lot at stake. The new governor, Rick Snyder (R), rammed through a law in March that allows him to take over local jurisdictions. Now, wherever he chooses, he can appoint a manager who will have authority to cancel contracts, cut worker and retiree benefits and fire duly-elected officeholders such as mayors and county supervisors. 

Corporate Tax Cuts

If that weren’t bad enough, Snyder is proposing a state budget that makes deep cuts in schools; raises taxes on seniors and the working poor; and eliminates the tax exemption for pensions. At the same time, Snyder wants $1.8 billion in tax cuts for businesses.

Similar formulas that penalize public employees, the poor and middle class, while cutting taxes for the rich and powerful, have taken shape in Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Iowa, Kansas, Maine, Pennsylvania, South Carolina and other states.

“Governors Walker and Kasich as well as other politicians are attempting to change the rules to silence workers so that corporate influences can go unchecked,” said AFSCME Secretary-Treasurer Lee Saunders at a rally in Memphis, Tennessee, on the anniversary of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s assassination. King was killed on April 4, 1968, while supporting Memphis sanitation workers in an AFSCME strike.

Dignity and Fairness

Saunders compared the quest of the sanitation workers for dignity and fair treatment to the current efforts of public service workers to defend their jobs and their unions. He said our attackers “have awakened a powerful movement and we will not allow them to steal our power or our future.”