Michigan’s budget is in crisis, and it’s going to take sacrifice, ideas and innovation to fix the deficit.
But that means everyone must sacrifice, everyone must bring ideas to the table, and everyone must be willing to craft innovative solutions for a decade-long problem.
Gov. Rick Snyder’s recent report titled “Citizen’s Guide to Michigan’s Financial Health” is the polar opposite of shared sacrifice. The report claims that public sector employees earn twice as much as their private sector counterparts. A claim so readily refuted that a follow-up report was released days later:
“Michigan public employees,” including state, local government workers and teachers, “are neither overpaid nor undercompensated,” Keefe said by telephone at a news conference in Lansing.
When only state employees are compared to the private sector, they are underpaid by about 7 percent, he said.
Instead of public employees making twice as much as private sector employees, they make 7% less. Shared sacrifice is necessary, but let’s make sure it’s shared first.