Yes, we know California is in the middle of a terrible budget crisis, and we know that Sacramento lawmakers have no excuse for not getting their collective acts together for long enough to figure out ways to deal with $15.2 billion shortfall and then pass a damn budget. But for Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to use the salaries of low level state employees as the carrot and stick to get the legislature moving, is the worst kind of political ploy.
And it won’t work.
I mean, do we really think that lawmakers are going to stop their wrangling because the clerks get a pay cut?
Wednesday night the news broke that Schwarzenegger will sign an Executive Order on Monday yanking the wages of over 200,000 state employees to $6.55 an hour, minimum wage. That’s $1,048 per month.
Yes, the governor has said that once the budget is passed he’ll pay everyone their full salaries. But what exactly are the state workers supposed to use to pay their (hopefully not subprime) mortgages in the meantime?
The LA Times has an editorial on the subject in this morning’s paper.
[SNIP]If it was all about getting the Legislature’s attention, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s plan to cut state workers’ pay to the federal minimum wage succeeded admirably. Democrats responded with shock. Republicans responded with incredulity. But so far, neither side has responded with a budget.
This kind of cruel brinkmanship pushes the real budget deadline to whatever August date is the last chance to send voters a tax measure for the November ballot, or the last chance to go to the financial market for the state’s equivalent of a payday loan. The pay of state workers and the tax bills of all Californians become the tokens on the game board, while in Sacramento, the players circle around one another.
Unconscionable.
As an UC employee (though the Gov. can’t directly cut our wages, his order asks the Regents to go along with the plan), I’d like to give a big, hearty, “fuck you” to Arnold.