The rationale for dropping public sector employee unions, whether in CA, San Diego, or Wisconsin, is that good faith, fair bargaining in the public interest cannot result when a union negotiates with elected officials. This was behind FDR’s opposition, as well as Gov. Walker in Wisconsin, and is now being recognized in San Diego.
In private sector negotiations, managements and unions duke it out fairly, since management has the long term interests of the company in mind. In the public sector, “management” is short term oriented, and only wants labor peace and to look good at the next election, so they make extravagent promises that will come due years later. Witness our city council a decade ago binding us to outsized pension benefits that we are just now being saddled with. Our San Diego School Board did the same 1-2 years ago, with the now-upcoming 7% pay hikes that will hit the fan in the next 12 months, likely forcing insolvency and shortening the already brief school year by 7 days. In 1999, CA bumped all existing state pensions, past and future, by 50% because the tech boom briefly boosted the stock market. State pensions are now squeezing out every other category in the state budget. In each of these cases, the savvy union leaders educated their membership to be patient, keep their lifetime compensation in mind, and stay united. Taxpayers got screwed because they were complacent. The media did not do its job, accountants and actuaries did not become whistleblowers (with some exceptions, like Diane Shipione in San Diego), and the liberal media looked the other way.
Add to all this the tendency in a democracy for special interest groups to have an outsized influence over policy when they individually have a lot at stake while the average voter/taxpayer only suffers a little and far in the future, and you often have unions “capturing” the management side of negotiations. The San Diego School Board is essentially owned by the union, and is a prime example of this, Our students are about to pay the price.
