California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger today ordered all state workers to take two days of unpaid leave each month to conserve money amid a record budget deficit and a legislative impasse over how to fix it.
The furloughs will begin in February and will last through June 2010, Schwarzenegger said in an executive order. He also ordered all departments to cut 10 percent of their workforce costs, through firings if necessary.
“Every California family and business has been forced to cut back during these difficult economic times, and state government cannot be exempt from similar belt tightening,” Schwarzenegger said in a letter to state workers.
The unions do not like this. They argue (proably correctly) that it violates collective bargaining agreements and they plan to sue. If they are correct, this order to should be overturned. A contract is a contract and rule of law is our most important resource. That goes out the window, and nobody will have anything for long.
The flip side of this is that Governor would be 100% within his rights to lay people off. That would mean cutting back on services, but he could do it.
But would the unions really rather 10% of the workforce laid off as opposed to everyone taking a 10% effective pay cut? The sad answer is yes.
Unions exist to serve the interests of people who have jobs. The 10% who lose their jobs will not be union members for very long. The 90% who keep their jobs will not have lost anything. From the stand point of a Union official there is no contest. They might protest long and hard against lay offs. But when push comes to shove, they always seem to go for layoffs as opposed to any other type of cut in payroll costs.
And that is one of the biggest problems with unions in a nutshell. Unions generally don’t have a problem with high rates of unemployment as long as their members are well paid and well treated.