Comparing Iowa public workers to private workers.

QUOTE from Maya Angelou: "Determine to live life with flair and laughter."

What I LEARNED today: For the last 10-12 days the nation has been focused on Madison, Wisconsin and what's happening there in regard to collective bargaining rights for public employees. This issue has now spread to other Republican controlled states such as Indiana, Ohio, Iowa and others. In all these states the effort by Republicans is the same - make public workers pay more for their benefits and restrict or totally take away the right of these workers to bargain collectively.

What I read this morning was quite interesting to me in regard to this issue and about public employees in Iowa. Here is what I LEARNED: The Iowa Policy Project did a study comparing Iowa's public and private employees in regard to educationasl levels, work experience, occupation and hours worked. The study discovered that Iowa male public workers earn nearly 12 percent less and Iowa female public sector workers earn 16 percent less than private sector workers with comparable occupations, hours, experience and education. The study went on to give some other stats but the essence of the study is summarized above.

As a public school teacher for 36 years I found it mind boggling that so many people thought we made a lot of money, and that we made more money than private workers with similar education. Plus quite a few felt we didn't deserve our benefits or our retirement because we had the summers to work to take care of those. It was depressing at times but when I considered the source I felt better. I used to tell them if what you think is true about teachers and their pay and benefits why don't you go back to school and become a teacher. They usually didn't have an answer.

As with the Wisconsin teachers I can agree that paying more for health insurance would be okay to a degree. But to take away all the bargaining rights for teachers and other public workers is definitely the wrong way to go. I can remember when we had no bargaining rights in the 1960s and early 1970s - it was depressing. The board could fire a teacher for little or no reason. My hope is that we don't go back to those dictatorial days.

HUMOR for today is from The Joker Magazine. This joke was written in 2009 - it is titled "401-Keg."

Something to think about! If you had purchased $1,000 of shares in Delta Airlines one year ago, you will have $49.00 today. If you purchased $1,000 of shares in AIG one year ago, you will have #33.00 today. If you purchased $1,000 of shares in Lehman Brothers one year ago, you will have $0.00 today. But, if you had purchased $1,000 worth of beer, then you turned in the aluminum cans for recycling refund, you will have received $214.00. Based on the above, the best current investment plan is to drink heavily and recycle. It is called the 401-Keg. A recent study found that the average American walks about 900 miles a year. Another study found that Americans drink, on average, 22 gallons of alcohol a year. That means that, on average, Americans get about 41 miles to the gallon! Makes you proud to be an American!