Cutting Noses To Spite Faces 101

"Cutting costs: Reducing wages of high-paid bosses could save local jobs
(Letter to the Editor, November 22, 2008)
In regard to the changes and layoffs due to the failure of the county sales tax issue, I have a suggestion. It is probably not going to happen, but if you took the 100 highest-salaried people in both the city and county governments, including M******l Hospital and Utilities, and reduced their salaries by 25 percent, they would still have very comfortable incomes, and it would help many of their co-workers keep their jobs.
With the economy down, I do not know why governments should not share in the slowdown, as the people affected are the people paying the salaries."

Yet another envy letter in the class-warfare rage so accelerated by the most recent election. I believe that this poisonous tone set by the election of Barack Obama will greatly eclipse any up tick in racism, real or perceived. His proposal comes with no hard numbers from any financial analysis or substantiation of any of his assertions. It is merely an uninformed knee-jerk response born of a ‘have’ vs. ‘have not’ mentality.

He does not tell us how much money would be saved by reducing the salaries of 100 people by 25% relative to the loss of revenues and budget shortfalls. Would it really make much difference at all? And his argument does not take into account how many people would leave and what the cost of replacing them and training the new employees would be. People who have based their lifestyles on a certain income are not going to just sit by and do nothing if that salary is arbitrarily reduced by 25%. Would he? An organization cannot attract, hire and hold on to quality people if it pays well below the prevailing market rates. If positions can be eliminated, then do so; but don’t try to hold on to people on the cheap. It won’t work. If you look into the budgets of the organizations referenced you will find that many cuts and changes have already taken place. These organizations and their employees are doing their part and feeling the pain, even though their financial plight is due to national and global economic realities totally beyond their control.
The most telling comment was his remark that after reducing these salaries by 25% he feels that these people would still have comfortable incomes. This idea that one person has the right and authority to determine would someone else ought to earn is downright heinous. This mindset has infected far too many in this country and it will do us in. People who study hard, work hard and take risks many times wind up doing very well financially. I don’t understand why people think that by punishing them all the rest are somehow magically benefited. If you kill the locomotive the train stops and everyone riding in the passenger cars get nowhere. Folks with disposable income invest some which creates and grows businesses thus leading to jobs for all the rest. Not to mention paying more taxes for government to dole out to others. They also spend some of that income on consumer goods, which again creates jobs for people who sell those products, manufacture those products and ship those products. If you take disposable income away from people who have earned it, you may be insuring your own unemployment in the process. A rising tide does indeed lift all boats, all of the liberal caterwauling to the contrary notwithstanding.