GUEST: Christie aims at unions

Will he eat unions now?
Will he eat unions now?

By Becca Fields

A budget crisis—that’s what the main-stream media are calling it. A shortfall of $800 million in THIS year’s state budget that has to be resolved by June 30, a matter of weeks.  But the real crisis isn’t simply a collection of numbers on a ledger book. The real crisis is the opportunity  this creates for Gov. Chris Christie’s—an opportunity for a dangerous attack on public employee unions.

Just as he did four years ago—with the help of cynical Democratic legislators—Christie will try to make unions and their members bear the brunt of the political maneuverings to try to fill that hole when most of the money available this year has been spent—or already cut to fill a hole discovered in February.

Christie cites the changes to federal government tax rates for the very wealthy resulting in much lower revenue for New Jersey than he estimated a year ago.  That is the excuse for this latest revenue shortfall, but ultimately we know he will blame the costs of pensions and benefits of our public sector employees.

Christie owns responsibility for this crisis.  He consistently overestimated revenues for every budget he proposed since taking office.  He refuses to consider rational revenue increases. Already this year, he acknowledged a $700 million “adjustment” in revenues – that was in addition to the new shortfall of $800 million. And the changed federal tax collection that resulted in a windfall last year as people paid early would result logically in a significant decrease of those revenues this year.  Anyone budgeting with honesty and vision would acknowledge this.

Mostly, Christie owns this catastrophe because it offers the perfect crisis that the Governor has waited for, or, perhaps, more likely, helped to create.  It sets the stage for his final attack on public sector unions as he blames the pensions and benefits payments for the situation.  Conveniently, Christie waited until the end of the fiscal year to make the required $1.67 billion payment to the pension plan. 

The easiest way out of this crisis is to delay that payment until after the start of the next fiscal year.  But not only will he blame the current short fall on the pension payment, but he will then begin cutting more deeply into next year’s budget to compensate for that payment.  He will make sure the pain continues and the blame is put squarely on unions and their members. Within weeks, we can expect to see legislation to further chip away, not just at pensions and benefits, but at the very core of union structure.  Think Wisconsin. Think North Carolina. It can happen here.

Don’t forget, his so-called “bipartisan agreement” with Democrats—known to the honest as a corrupt deal with political bosses like George Norcross—projected him on to the national political stage. Another miraculous “bipartisan agreement” with weak Democrats will help him climb out of the slime of Bridgegate and restore his weakened presidential chances.

All at the expense of unions. We may be witnessing his end game-–to destroy public employee unions once and for all.  His narrative blames the state’s financial woes—not on his ineptitude, his shortsightedness, his mendacious manipulation of revenue figures—but on the alleged greed of unions.  If he has not deliberately created the financial crisis to bring us to this point, he most certainly encouraged it to happen.  He has every piece in place and he can see a few moves forward to checkmate. 

So unions had better be ready to fight – not over whether the pension payment should be delayed, but for their very survival.  We learned in 2010 that we are pretty much on our own—even Democrats can’t be trusted to stand with unin members who have their own, personal financial crises to deal with.

In unity, with one voice, unions must come to the table with a plan to move us forward out of this crisis, a plan  that shares sacrifice, doesn’t simply heap it on to those who can least afford it. 

Every union leader and every member must be clear about what is at stake. The very existence of public employee unions.

Becca Fields is the pseudonym for a progressive activist.

7 comments
  1. All the states around New Jersey, with Democratic governors, (New York, Connecticut, Pennsylvania) are doing well, generating new jobs thus more revenue. NJ is towards the bottom nationally in terms of unemployment rates and overall economy alongside Mississippi. Folks better wake up!

  2. Christie already blamed public sector pensions for the lack of funding for cancer research in NJ. He has waged all out nuclear war against the teacher unions, especially the NJEA, from day one. Christie gets plenty of air support from the media, especially right wing radio (is there any other kind of talk radio), NJ 101.5 (especially Jim Gearhart), CNBC and Fox News. Christie never passes up an opportunity to demonize, swift boat and slander the NJEA. The Democrats pay lip service to unions but mostly stand idly by as the GOP attacks unions 24/7. Obama and the congressional Democrats did nothing to enact EFCA which would have helped unions to increase membership. Rahm Emanuel has been an open and hostile foe of the Chicago teachers’ union; governor Cuomo of NY isn’t much better. The elites and the oligarchs want to return us to 1852; they hate unions and want to destroy all of them but especially the teachers’ unions.

  3. Except for the fact that PA has a nearly equally terrible Republican Governor in Tom Corbett…

  4. Good post – but just curious – why does a “progressive activist” have to write pseudonymously?

    What leverage does the Gov. have?

    Do you work for the Christie Administration in an non-civil service position?

    Progressives need to stand up and be counted.

  5. […] A budget crisis—that’s what the main-stream media are calling it. A shortfall of $800 million in THIS year’s state budget that has to be resolved by June 30, a matter of weeks.  But the real crisis isn’t simply a collection of numbers on a ledger book. The real crisis is the opportunity  this creates for Gov. Chris Christie’s—an opportunity for a dangerous attack on public employee unions.  Continue reading → […]

  6. Well, there is no surprise here, for those of you who think the CC playbook doesn’t model the Koch brother’s agenda for bringing us back not to the last century, but to the previous 2; just take a look at the ALEC agenda, American Legislative Exchange Council, birth place to all bad anti-everything/education/union/women/voter rights/health etc. etc. courtesy of the Koch brothers. http://www.alec.org/
    The democrats agenda for reform was a fill in the blanks, need to get rid of all of them and start fresh with new ideas…educating the public would be wise.

  7. […] understand and in no way perpetuates: please. See here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here. Yes: the disrespect certainly has been […]

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