We've all seen the arguments against public sector unions, and have seen how bullying them can give your political career a boost. State employees' unions especially are a double-edged sword, with the powers of a voting bloc allowing them to be the biggest burden on the state.
On the other side of the spectrum, however, we have to remember that these unions exist for a reason: Public employees are at the mercy of the democratic process, and with all the budget hawks out there (and they are much more vicious on the state and especially local level) these workers need something to stand in the way of the people saying "fuck you, i don't want to pay more taxes to have you teach my kid, just shut up and teach my kid." One can observe this all the more in states where local school district tax-hikes have to be approved in referendum, and they are basically *never* approved. Especially for schools, the pettiness of local politics could create a great deal of unfairness for some teachers that happened to get in the way of one school board member or other's agenda.
Thus i propose a middle solution, one that eliminates the ability of public sector unions to impose unfair burdens on the state, while at the same time guaranteeing the rights of the workers: A "Constitutional Bargain."
Basically it would entail an agreement for the workers to de-unionize in exchange for certain fair labor standards and the means to fund them being enshrined in State Constitutions. This way it would be very, very hard for the government on either the state or school-board level to mess with relative salary changes, hiring and firing standards, or benefits levels, and at the same time, the employees would be unable to use their votes to hold folks hostage for more.
Also we should detach high-school athletics from the high-schools, and make them into independent programs (tangental, but something that should still be done)
Monster Hunter: pissing me off since 2010.
