Sunday, February 20, 2011

Quote of the Day: Public Sector Unions vs. Taxpayers

Take a look:
In the romantic liberal vision of this union uprising, determined workers are standing up to the powerful. But there's no fat-cat owner wanting to pocket more profits here. The unions' target in Wisconsin is the taxpayer. 
At bottom, this is the unions versus the people. 
For much of the Left, though, this about protecting the power of labor. Again, this ignores the fundamental difference between public-sector unions and private-sector unions. Even Franklin Roosevelt said, "The process of collective bargaining, as usually understood, cannot be transplanted into the public service." 
As the Wall Street Journal pointed out, campaign contributions by government-sector unions, collected through mandatory dues, help elect the public officials who are then supposed to negotiate with them: "The unions sit, in effect, on both sides of the bargaining table."
Read the whole thing.  Note how it makes the important distinction between private sector unions and public sector ones.  It's a distinction all too often lost in the current debate in Madison.

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