State Treasurer Timothy P. Cahill, a former Democrat running as an independent, issued a statement saying, “We have yet to see costs brought down in state payroll because there have been very few if any reductions in the state workforce,” and called the Patrick administration figures “phantom numbers.”
But the numbers Cahill’s campaign used to buttress his argument are problematic, at best. Citing data from the payroll that his office processes, Cahill said the state biweekly payroll has increased about 15 percent since Patrick took office, and he pointed to information on the Patrick administration’s own Labor and Workforce Development website to claim the number of state employees has increased since Patrick took office to 123,100 people employed in “state government” as of March.
The jobs data, however, is not based on actual state payroll numbers or even jobs in state government, according to Alison Harris, a spokeswoman for the labor agency. It is an estimate based on a statistical sample and includes part-time jobs and positions in what she called a “wide spectrum of public sector agencies” that extends beyond state government to independent authorities.
Actual state payroll numbers appear regularly in the official statements of state bond offerings, which Cahill, as treasurer, signs off on. The office of state comptroller periodically updates the tally of employees on its website. There are currently the equivalent of about 84,000 full-time state employees, nearly a third fewer than the figure Cahill touted.
Cahill, in short, is making shit up.
Also very interesting is the story’s comparisons to two recent governors, both of whom were Republicans. This appears at the top of the story:
Virtually all of Patrick’s reductions have been made in the past year, however, and thus far have not been as deep as prior rounds of payroll slashing in recessions by William F. Weld in the early 1990s and Mitt Romney in 2003 and 2004. In Romney’s case, most of the jobs were restored as the economy improved.
No surprise there. Patrick, after all, is a Democrat, and I for one would be disappointed to learn that he was running things the way a Republican would. And later in the story, the details come out:
Weld and Romney both initiated early retirement incentive programs. That saved money in the short term but resulted in significantly higher costs in enhanced pension benefits over the next 15 years, Gonzalez said.
Weld slashed about 8,000 state jobs in his first term in office, and Romney cut about 4,000 in his first 18 months before nearly all of the jobs were restored as the economy rebounded. Most of the Weld job cuts were in the sprawling health and human services secretariat, as the administration contracted out many services to private-sector companies.
Aha. So Romney cut jobs when times were tough, but restored them all later, for a net change of roughly zero. And Weld eliminated jobs by privatizing human services. And both of them shifted employees onto the rolls of the already overburdened pension system.
In short, neither of them did anything that one would expect from a responsible Democratic governor.
Kudos to Brian Mooney for a superb article. And kudos to the Patrick administration, whose claims have been vindicated, and whose management of the worst financial crisis since 1929 is looking better and better.
the unquestioned assumption in the story and in all of the debate over it is that simply cutting thousands of state workers is an ideal solution to our state budget crisis. But who has been cut, and what were their functions?
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p>What we have here is an academic argument over numbers. Patrick cut 2,457 position, while Baker would cut 5,000.
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p>Were these mostly direct-care workers making $20,000 a year, or were they supervisors? And in what agencies did they work? What types of services were affected? Those are the questions that have hardly been explored in the media and don’t even seem to be part of the debate over the candidates’ records. Yet, those are the questions that matter to people who use government services, and that includes all of us.
this story was an essential first step that was desperately needed. Now we have the basic facts. Next step is to flesh them out as you suggest.
6 6s for you my friend.
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p>Numbers shumumbers. I remember when Romney thought there were too many lawyers in state government so he cut them in half and pulled the rest in his office. What a mess with no experienced lawyers to attend to child protection cases, toxic waste clean up, etc etc.
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p>I’m sorry David it’s who has be laid off that counts not how many.
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p>Looking for specifics here BMGers. What do you know?
As much as I’ve always admired Brian Mooney as a reporter, I don’t think this story was his best work. Measuring a governor’s performance by how many state employee positions he has cut is misleading at best. I disagree with David that the story was an essential first step.
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p>This story perpetuates the myth that state workes are all equal in terms of their value, and that that value is uniformly negative. Otherwise, why would eliminating as many state employees as possible be considered a measure of how well a governor is doing?
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p>The only conclusion I can really draw from this story is that when it comes to dealing with the budget crisis, there seems to be little or no difference between Deval Patrick, Bill Weld, and Charlie Baker.
so much as he was measuring the candidates’ honesty. The governor was honest, Baker and Cahill weren’t.
However, as Ryan and others have indicated one question is really about getting at the truth of what is being said.
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p>Facts are funny things and all that. If the Baker and Cahill campaigns want to claim that we need to get rid of Deval because has increased state spending or increased the payroll etc. then someone needs to point out that those things are simply not true.
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p>Political debates and policy debates unfortunately have little in common. From a policy perspective it would be great to hear from people who know what the effects of the various layoffs have been. who has been cut, what are the salaries etc.
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p>So I think David is right that this is an important piece that goes to the heart of the political question and Judy is right that from a policy perspective we need a lot more information and analysis.
the story attempts to set the record straight about how much Gov. Patrick has cut government. The problem is that there is little or no policy perspective or context here. I think the story should have included either a disclaimer or some context.
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p>For instance, the reporter might have interviewed an expert or simply pointed out himself that a governor who has cut the most employees has not necessarily saved the most money in doing so (he may have cut only or mostly low-paid employees compared to another governor who may have cut fewer, but more highly-paid employees.)
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p>The story should also have made it clear that there are many areas in the budget that can be cut other than personnel (local aid funding or entitlement or other benefits for instance). Simply pointing out that fact would show the spuriousness of Baker’s and Cahill’s single-minded focus on personnel numbers.
5 $20,000 workers = 1 Patrick crony at $100,000. Sorry I’m not blind enough to buy this excrement.
Yes.
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p>Even your excrement is cute!
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p>Hugs and kisses,
KBusch
Today’s Globe story is, unfortunately, another in a long and growing line of examples of the Baker campaign saying one thing while the facts point out something different.
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p>At some point, the actual issues, whether its the number of state jobs cut or health care or the growth of the state budget, matter less than the fact that voters can not trust Charlie Baker.
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p>Let’s review just a few examples:
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p>Taxes: The Baker campaign has decided to make taxes a big issue in this campaign. Baker even kicked off his campaign with a “no new taxes” pledge. Yet the Globe pointed out that, as a selectman, Baker voted twice for property tax increases. And his choice for LG, Richard Tisei, also has a record of voting for taxes in the State Legislature.
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p>Reform: The Baker campaign has also chosen to make reform a centerpiece of the campaign. Yet when questioned by the Herald on a major reform of the Patrick administration, civilian flaggers and the Quinn bill, Baker caved to pressure and opposed both reforms.
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p>State Spending: Baker has tried to make the case that spending is out of control. However, Mass Taxpayers Foundation confirmed that state spendng grew faster under Baker’s tenure at A+F than during Patrick’s first term, and all three independent rating agencies have credited Governor Patrick with strong, responsible management of the budget during the global economic crisis.
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p>There are many other examples – climate change, the transgender bill, health care premiums are just a few. Today’s story is another. At some point, the real issue in this campaign will be whether voters can trust what Charlie Baker is selling them.