California to Reduce 200,000 Workers to Minimum Wage
by Jeff Davis
Cities and states across America are teetering on the edge of bankruptcy and resorting to extraordinary measures to cut employee costs. One of the ways in which private sector employers have avoided paying benefits such as medical insurance is through the use of temporary employees or contractors. Now it looks like this practice is being adopted by state and local governments many of which are on the verge of bankruptcy.
The Wall Street Journal reports: “Faced with a $118 million budget deficit, the city of San Jose, Calif., recently decided it could no longer afford its own janitors. So the city’s budget called for dropping its custodial staff and hiring outside contractors to clean its city hall and airport, saving about $4 million. To keep all its swimming pools open and staffed, the city is replacing some city workers with contractors. After years of whittling staff and cutting back on services, towns and cities are now outsourcing some of the most basic functions of local government, from policing to trash collection. Services that cities can no longer afford to provide are being contracted to private vendors, counties or even neighboring towns. The move saves cities budget-crushing costs of employee benefits like health insurance and retirement. Maywood, a tiny city southeast of Los Angeles, is taking contracting to the extreme. The city of around 40,000 is letting go of its entire staff and contracting with outsiders to perform all city services. The city is disbanding its police force and handing public safety over to the Los Angeles County Sheriff. Its neighbor, the city of Bell, will take over running Maywood’s City Hall.” (more…)
RSS 2.0
Atom 0.3
RSS 0.92
RDF