The Albuquerque Journal continues its quirky crusade to insist on all levels of government posting the salaries of all public employees. It is bizarre to need to know what a janitor makes at UNM, but they think it is important. They basically think the need for people to know this rests on the case that government controls information and power and that we ought to know what those denizens all make in the way of wages.
So, once again I call on the Journal to make public the wages of all of their employees, right down to the janitors(unless they have given that assignment to the beat reporters.) After all, they control the flow of information and power too. Don't give me that fluff about it not being government and not being required. Their right wing stands make them a better case for knowing who makes what.
And they don't even do their real jobs. How can they have a front page story on the Governor's little crash landing without knowing that the private pilot had another incident just a year or two ago? Will they at least look into it? Or is it up to the bloggers? Oh, and on a final transparency note, I make no salary or advertising revenue from my blog.
3 comments:
Their real target is ordinary working people like janitors who they'd like to cast judgment on how much they are paid This is the same campaign against working people as the rest of the Republican war against workers and for whom Romney and Bain Capital did "honorable" work and were paid what they deserved because of their perceived "higher worth and skills". We will not see a expose of Bain Capital's employee compensation and Mr. Romney's income. Afterwall, as the Republican meme goes, they ARE the "wealth (I mean) the job creators".
"The University of New Mexico’s Sunshine Portal has officially gone live.
In it you can find employee salaries and university contracts of $20,000 or more."
This obscures the fact that more than half of University teaching in the US is now done by temporary, part-time faculty that has no benefits or job security. Each contract is for much less than $20,000, so won't show up on the list.
Vicki is on the right track, seeing this through the lens of a class analysis.
Besides this placing it in the context of the election, think about what has gone on in states like Wisconsin, Ohio, Indiana, where Republican governors have intentionally pitted public sector and private sector workers against each other.
Think of the dichotomy they are always trying to set up between foreign and domestic workers.
Also union worker and non union worker. Think of the governor's subtle backhands, if only via her policies, against teachers, who coincidentally are predominately unionized.
The typical Journal reader will see what a union janitor makes and be resentful. The pump is primed for an attack on public sector workers here in NM.
Never mind that the higher wages and benefits unions fought for all these years raised the overall standard of living here, since non union employers have had to compete in the same labor market where good union jobs were always available.
That's just the point though, to lower wages, and our standard of living. Trickle down governor, trickle down newspaper. Eventually, as people begin to see their own living standards under attack, more people will get this point. Then, and only then I suppose, Democratic candidates and elected officials will have to get on the bandwagon, but I don't see much class analysis coming from them these days, just these diffuse promises to fight for the "Middle Class" that obligate them to nothing and so don't upset their funders.
But like Vicki says, it's a war on the workers.
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