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Fun with numbers

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* From the Illinois Policy Institute’s news service…

What should be a resolved labor dispute between the state and its largest public employee union is instead costing taxpayers an additional $3 million each day, Gov. Bruce Rauner said.

AFSCME has been without a contract since July 2015. Although the state labor board ruled over a month ago that the two sides were officially at an impasse and Gov. Rauner can enact his “last, best, and final” offer, the union continues to challenge that ruling.

Rauner said last week that there’s a daily cost from the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) union’s appeal to a higher court of the state labor board’s ruling that the talks had reached an impasse.

“Every day that we delay through these court actions costs the people of Illinois almost $3 million per day,” Rauner said. “Think of how much we could do for our children in poverty, think of how much we could do for our schools and our human services if we weren’t wasting almost $3 million a day on this contract.”

$3 million a day seems kinda high, so I checked in with AFSCME. I was told that if you look at just the people on whom Rauner is attempting to impose his contract demands, that’s “about 25,000 employees.”

$3 million per day divided by 25,000 unionized workers is $120 per person, per day.

That’s a huge cut. Gigantic, even. I mean, that’s $600 a week, man.

* Related…

* VIDEO: Interview with Anders Lindall

posted by Rich Miller
Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 2:16 pm

Comments

where does the gov get his numbers?

Comment by spidad60 Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 2:24 pm
Loving God 3 million is not the number that panics me

25,000

25,000

Just last week I was saying NPR St Louis reported

30,000

Down from 38,000

34% decline in our state workforce

Comment by Honeybear Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 2:24 pm
Please ask the Governir to show his work. As near as i can tell, his cost is the 2.5 hours per week of possible overtime, and the premium increase/coverage decrease your employ health insurance. Those last two apply to all state employees under all the constitutional officers. So 25,000 employees is inaccurate for that.

On the other hand, he’s saving 25,000 since he isn’t paying out $1000 bonuses,plus whatever merit pay bonuses would have been paid for later years if the contract.

Comment by Thoughts Matter Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 2:25 pm
Glad to see he’s thinking of what could be done with $160 million for social services. Imagine if we had a budget and paid contracts to agencies that have already provided services. Boy, that would really be something.

Comment by illini97 Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 2:28 pm
The real shame is something is happening in Illinois government and someone isn’t making a profit. Thank God Rauner is goin’ to fix it.

Comment by Rogue Roni Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 2:28 pm
Can we make it a convention that everyone use quotation marks when referring to IPI’s “news service”?
Or maybe put a wink emoji after the words?

Comment by Keyrock Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 2:28 pm
Rather than Rich doing the math, perhaps we could ask AFSCME what they estimate the daily extra cost is to the tax payers as they sit under the old contract versus what the Governor proposes. I agree it probably isn’t $3 million/day, but it is likely more than $1 million when you consider the 37.5 hours and health care proposal.

Comment by Mod Dem Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 2:30 pm
Honeybear, I had the same reaction. How did we get down to 25,000? What will the number be on January 1? My inbox is flooded with retirement announcements.

Comment by Anon Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 2:30 pm
Honeybear, but the 25,000 number is just those covered by AFSCME. There’s lots covered by other unions, and some who had no union at all.

Comment by Arsenal Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 2:31 pm
If EDGE tax incentives expire we’ll have 589,041 going into our coffers every day maybe more since that uses last years lower numbers.

How about we talk about real numbers instead of made up ones.

Comment by Fudo Myoo Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 2:32 pm
===tax payers===

AFSCME members are “tax payers” too.

Don’t look now, but your distain towards Labor is showing.

Comment by Oswego Willy Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 2:32 pm
Thoughts Matter, good point. It would cost him $25,000,000 to pay his meager $1,000 payola bonus to everyone so we’re saving the state that money by appealing.

Comment by Anon Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 2:33 pm
the governor goes to an astrologist when it comes to getting figures and statistics to about ASFCME …SMH

Comment by anon Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 2:34 pm
The union and Democrats should take this and run with it. The messaging writes itself:

“A multimillionaire whose income more than tripled as governor wants to slash tens of thousands of middle class state workers.”

“A multimillionaire and his billionaire supporters created a crisis that caused a million sick, poor, old and vulnerable Illinoisans to lose social services in order to slash the pay, benefits and rights of many thousands of middle class workers.”

Let’s not also forget that Rauner got a huge income tax cut last year, while making $188 million.

Something along these lines–done by professionals.

Comment by Grandson of Man Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 2:35 pm
Ooda loop. Doesn’t matter what the dollar amount is. Without a budget none of those dollars would be going to children in poverty, schools or human services. Ooda loop moot.

Comment by Henry Francis Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 2:37 pm
“Creating dollars”… use this trick;)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ltqHJTY8Fhk

Comment by Anon221 Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 2:41 pm
I don’t understand. Is he saying he wants individual state employees to take home $600 less per week? If so, then what’s all the fuss about? That isn’t that much money if you’re rich. Get over it peasants - retailers are hiring second shift RIGHT now.

Comment by hot chocolate Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 2:42 pm
The 25000 that is quoted are all bargaining units in AFSCME other than RC-6 and CU-500. Those are security staff for DHS, DOC, and DJJ and are currently in interest arbitration (same as state police) as they are legally unable to strike. That’s why that number seems so low, Honeybear

Comment by Fixer Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 2:48 pm
Arsenal, honestly I don’t know what’s up but it looks and feels correct. But the number above did not include the others. Council said 6 months ago 38000. NPR said 30000 last week now Rich is saying 25000. THIS is what I have been screaming about! Even if the numbers are off its still an alarming and accelerating rate of collapse. This month I know a LOT of people retiring! These folks are not being replaced. Look at the state job, 481 jobs open. Not to mention that one posting can indicate multiple positions like HSC. This is worse than I thought.

Comment by Honeybear Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 2:49 pm
–That’s a huge cut. Gigantic, even. I mean, that’s $600 a week, man.–

That’s peanuts for someone who makes over half a million dollars a day off of his investments. Half a million dollars A DAY!

Comment by Henry Francis Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 2:52 pm
I’m sure the number comes from the transference of ALL healthcare costs to the public servant. That’s why it would be 600 a week. Someone test that theory. It’s what they are planning. RNUG knows I’m right about that.

Comment by Honeybear Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 2:55 pm
Rich makes an excellent point. The Governor’s proposal translates into a direct loss of approx. $620/month for each AFSCME employee. Probably 90% of that is related to healthcare changes.

The Governor also seems to forgets about the other thousands of non-union employees in the executive and other two branches of government that will be impacted mainly because of healthcare issues.

While it might sound great to cut $3M a day, when the $3M is actually a pay decrease for people you have to recognize that will also impact the economy and the community, particularly downstate communities. People will tighten their belts, which less eating out at local restaurants, fewer shopping trips to contribute to sales tax and local businesses, etc.

Comment by facts matter Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 2:59 pm
==AFSCME members are “tax payers” too.

Don’t look now, but your distain towards Labor is showing.==

Lol worry not Oswego Willy. Just wait until January 20th and Trump puts in his say for the 7th Supreme Cory judge

Comment by Anonymous Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 2:59 pm
Whoops meant to say 9th.

Comment by Anonymous Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 3:01 pm
I never thought, as a Republican, that it was our party’s goal to dictate the wages and rights of workers in any walk of life.

Like I said, the distain and jealously for working people is showing.

Comment by Oswego Willy Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 3:03 pm
AFSCME should be using the Governor’s numbers in their press releases: “The governor is asking us to agree to an average $30,000/yr pay cut for our members. Most of them would go broke.” (That’s what you get when you do the math on $120/day.)

Comment by Pot calling kettle Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 3:48 pm
–“Think of how much we could do for our children in poverty, think of how much we could do for our schools and our human services if we weren’t wasting almost $3 million a day on this contract.”–

The answer, of course, is nothing, as the governor and the IPI Ministry of Truth know.

As of today, the backlog of unpaid state bills is $10.8 billion, projected to be $14 billion by June 30.

And the FY17 deficit ranges from an optimistic $8 billion to a pessimistic $13 billion.

If you multiple average annual work days, 262 by $3 million, you get $786 million.

Real money, but a drop in the bucket to the billions in new debt that are being added this fiscal year.

Comment by wordslinger Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 3:58 pm
Think of what we could do for the citizens of Illinois if the demands for term limits and a permanent property tax freeze were dropped and we passed a balanced budget.

Comment by Anonymous Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 4:47 pm
So — the Governor’s position is that AFSCME’s employees should lose an average of $31,200 in total annual compensation?

… Is that including some kind of unconstitutional pension reform?

He’s going to impose 1.1 billion in annual savings. Yikes.

Comment by Anon Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 4:54 pm
Wouldn’t we assume the $3 million/day is including insurance savings (whether or not they’d stand after lawsuits and what-not) from state university employees and retirees? What’s that bring the math to? $15/day about?

Comment by Robert the 1st Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 5:03 pm
=Council said 6 months ago 38000. NPR said 30000 last week now Rich is saying 25000.=

That’s what’s left after we pull out IDOC and State Police right? They won’t have terms imposed as they have arbitration and can’t strike.

Comment by Robert the 1st Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 5:14 pm
120 dollars a day.

600 a week.

2400 a month.

So I dont even take home that much as a state worker so Rauner would literally be making me pay to work for the State with those numbers.

No thanks

Comment by John Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 5:44 pm
Take this the other way, 3 mil per day is about 90 mil per month which times 12 is 1.08 billion a year times 4 years is over 4 billion. So can he produce some facts on where this 3 million comes from or when you are the Governor you can just make stuff up and nobody questions you?

Comment by reasonable Tuesday, Dec 13, 16 @ 8:13 pm