New Castle County/ public employees reach sweet deal with taxpayer dollars

Readers of this blog will remember back in January when we did a story on a report from the Wilmington News Journal confirming an allegation made during the 2010 U.S. Senate campaign that New Castle County was broke.  Dace Blaskowitz, a political independent, found that the "NCCo government is simply unsustainable" and that the answer to their rampant overspending has consistently been higher and higher property taxes and sewer fees.  You may also remember that Mr. Blaskowitz found that 75% of New Castle County government costs are tied up in personnel and that is after a 2.5%paycut in 2009 and anotherin 2010.

Blaskowitz suggested a reduction in staff levels and contraction of benefit obligations yet New Castle County has gone on a hiring spree lately.  He also suggested some minimal concessions from the unions with regard to pay/benefits might be necessary to close the gap between revenue and expenditures.  The Clark Administration has said that it will work with the unions but that it is getting serious about the County finances.  Today however, sources within the County unions confirm that a deal has been reached and will be signed tomorrow.  The deal is reported to be a two year deal with county employees contributing $1200 per year to a healthcare savings fund.  In exchange for this surcharge payment, county employees will get a 5% increase (covering their two 2.5% reductions in the past 2 years) plus 3 new paid fulough days each year.  County employees will not have any holidays or current off time taken away.  Sources say that County Council Executive Paul Clark will sign the deal tomorrow afternoon.

Does this mean that our County finances are back in order?  Just a month ago when County Council passed the FY 2012 budget, Clark was talking about another 2.5% cut and other concessions from the unions.  In fact, his budget passed, despite strong opposition from Council President Kovach with the specific plan to make those cuts.  Kovach cited concerns that the budget did not properly address the current debt and also questions as to how unions would rollback 5% of their pay and then agree to ANOTHER cut of 2.5%.  Also, is it possible that the 3 extra paid furlough days are equal to that 2.5% cut?

The New York Times Proves Me Right

I have pointed out that Wisconsin is not the only state to see their pension/healthcare benefits become unsustainable. The same thing is happening all over the country, especially here in Delaware. Local union leaders and public employees have called me crazy, they've attacked me, they've insisted I was lying, that public employees are not paid as well as private sector workers and that they simply planned better than the rest of us. They have defended collective bargaining as "a human right" (we'll get to that later). Today, the New York Times did a story and released a study that shows that in fact, as a whole, public sector employees are better paid than private sector workers. They do downplay the numbers as you would expect a left wing "news" outlet to do but the facts are even undeniable for them. They point out that state and local government salaries w/benefits nationwide average $70,000 while private sector workers average just $61,000 and that gap isn't shrinking, it's growing. The NYT tempers this analysis by pointing out a discrepency in the TYPE of worker (blue collar vs. white collar) but what they don't point out is that the private sector salary includes the $58 million per year CEO and the $13 per hour retail salesperson. The next stat is stunning, public sector workers put in FAR fewer hours per week than private workers and they cost 70% MORE than private sector workers. While the NYT makes an argument defending public workers for having higher degrees (doesn't seem to help with the way our government runs), it fails to point out that their study includes young workers in the private sector who are either in college and working full-time or simply haven't gone to school. In addition, the Times breaks down individual sectors (a favorite of union leaders since salaries fluctuate based on occupation type) and finds descrepencies among service jobs (which they explain away with the caveat that it includes Police, Fire and Rescue workers) and clerical jobs (where they point out a slightly less obvious gap). The average private sector clerical worker costs their employer about $24 per hour while public sector clerical workers average about $29 per hour. The picture on the left details the unfunded retiree healthcare liabilities (not pensions, wages or active worker healthcare costs) for the U.S. as a whole. What about Delaware? Our retiree healthcare costs (not pensions) are only 1.45% funded. That's right folks, as of 2008, the Pew Research Center found that Delaware owed 5.4 BILLION in retiree healthcare and more than $100 million in pension benefits (to give an idea of the current levels, TODAY our pensions are underfunded by $700 million).

Continue reading on Examiner.com: New York Times Proves That Public Sector is Paid More Than Private Sector - Wilmington Education |