An Interesting Comparison

The Governor of Wisconsin has been cheered on by conservatives for his bravery in taking on the teacher’s union as well as other public service workers. He needs concessions from them to balance the state budget. Conservatives are all in a twitter over the fact that the average teacher’s salary in Wisconsin is $51,000 a year. I find that an interesting area of concern when conservatives maintain that people who make $250,000 a year can hardly make do and need a tax cut. The disparity in this comparison is puzzling indeed.


A further insistence by the Governor of Wisconsin that even though teachers are under contract he ought to be able to breach that contract and get financial concessions from them When reminded that contracts should not be violated the response from conservatives has been that the tough times require us to make hard decisions. People who work in public service must realize that their employment contracts cannot remain binding under such conditions.


Back when the country was in a financial crisis, Wall Street bankers who drove their companies to the verge of bankruptcy were still getting multimillion dollar bonuses. We were reminded that contracts are binding and could not be violated just because we were in a financial crisis. The message here is that for really wealthy people contracts may not be impaired but for people who make $50,000 a year as a public employees, contracts are meaningless.


From my perspective these comparisons show the moral bankruptcy of conservative leaders in America. What is good for one income group should be good for the other. It appears that conservatives are indeed waging class warfare.