An independent commission is considering reducing the salaries of members of the Legislature and statewide elected officials, including the governor, by 10%. That seems fair to me, especially considering other state employees have taken pay cuts and the state budget problems have been mishandled by our lawmakers. They've earned a pay cut.
Here are the details from The Sacramento Bee:
The pay cuts appeared all but certain Wednesday after a harried series of events that began when the California Citizens Compensation Commission fell one vote shy of ordering the salary reductions starting late next year.
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger promptly declared support for the pay cuts -- and immediately appointed three additional commission members to help pass them.Members of the compensation commission voted 3-1 in favor of the 10 percent pay cut Wednesday morning. But the reduction for elected officials couldn't take effect because the seven-member panel needed four votes to pass the motion. Three board vacancies had yet to be filled.
But later on Wednesday, Schwarzenegger filled the vacant seats with two Republicans, Los Angeles County Sheriff's Sgt. John Stites and executive search firm partner Scott Somers, and one Democrat, Denita Willoughby, a vice president of external affairs for AT&T.
They reportedly will vote for the pay cut.
All institutionalized employees should have to take a pay cut. All the people that work for Federal, State, County, City organizations and those who directly derive their income from taxpayer dollars. And how about stopping Colas for a while?
Most everybody in the private sector has taken pay and benefit cuts, that is if they haven't lost their jobs.
Really, if you not working for the government or public agancys it is very very tough to make it anymore.
I had to take a salary cut, why not them? Not to mention I don't get anything near to what they get in perks.
It is not enough! How about biting the bullet and making it 20 %?
YES! What appLies for one, applies for ALL.
Absolutely California legislators should take a pay cut. They're the highest paid legislature in the world.
They should also have to start paying taxes on their "per diem" instead of getting some $30,000-$40,000 under the table.
They should have to start paying for their own gas.
And, We the People, should amend the Constitution to state that any time the budget is late, every single legislator is out of office come the next election. Surely, a whole new slate can't do any worse than the witless wonders already there.
By the way, judges in the smaller counties are grossly overpaid. The two judges here in Mariposa don't do anywhere near the work of judges in the bigger counties and should not be getting paid just as much. A two, and perhaps three-tier, system should be put into place.
There's a lot of fat that can be cut.
It is only symbolic to implement pay cuts for the current crop of elected legislators in Sacramento. The amount of money saved just doesn't matter. What would make a difference, though, would be a 100% pay cut! DON'T VOTE FOR A SINGLE INCUMBENT!!!!!
The problem arises from stupid voters saying, "The problem is all the other guys, not the two I voted for. Toss them all out, swab the decks, and start over!
They have not learned that it is our money, not their's. They should not be paid at all. They are completely responsable for this mess and should suffer the consequences.
They should view public service as an obligation of citizenship and donate their service.
Many in the legislature can make more money at home then sitting in the State Capital.
It's not like they did this for the money, it's the power, it's the egos as well.
Without a doubt Lawmakers should take no less than the cuts all other State employees must take. Plus they should not be paid when they do not produce a budget on time. They also should not get any retroactive pay once the budget is finished. Whe I was in the work place and given an assignment, mu boss expected me to get it done on time. If I failed each time to produce I would be fired.
yes
Yes, America would like to export democracy to the world. Her people think it is a great thing, for has it not brought them wealth? Her rulers also think it is a great thing, because it not only brings them wealth, but it brings them power as well, both at home and in other nations. The more "democratic" another nation is, after all, the closer the rich and the powerful can work together, the greater the pickings and the booty available, and the less controls there are on their actions. The rich can grow richer and the poor can grow poorer because, after all, the rich think, it's the survival of the fittest.
No,American democracy is not one of the best exports to the world, because it is not godly democracy, and it is even less fitted to many other nations than it is to America.
I don't agree with stopping COLAS but I do agree that members of the legislature should take a pay cut. Most public employees try to do their jobs but those 120 lazy roustabouts in Sacramento, known as our Legislature, should not be paid at all if they don't fulfill their obligations. Does anyone else get paid for not doing what they are mandated to do by the nature of the job? Of course not. Neither should they. No budget, no pay - and not to be returned later. Hell, I'd cut the legislators' pay by 50% and force them to get real jobs in the real world so that they could experience what the rest of us have to in real time.
I have said all along that they need to get hit in the wallet like everyone else. 10% is not enough but I doubt they would pass anything more than that.
Our California lawmakers are definitely overpaid especially when you consider their per diem and performance. A 10% pay cut would be OK, a 15% cut would be better, and a 20% cut would be just and fair.
I would lke to take a moment out of this feeding frenzy and think about taxes and over regulation. You want limited salaries, then limit government.
Now is your chance.
No on 1A through 1F
Message for JIM DOYLE:
Will you step up and donate your services just as you are demanding from others?
Taxpayers must understand that they receive back a lot for what they begrudgingly pay. Start by counting your public service benefits like the street you step out on every morning when you leave your home. It is simplistic to say that public servants elected or hired should perform services with less or no compensation. That does not begin to address the issues. The fact is that the US private sector jobs are being cut because the owners of the businesses and corporations have exploited their shareholders, investors and employees with the Las Vegas style management of their sector for the past 8 permissive Bush years. The blame lies on business leaders! Don't go after the government servants to balance the budget because the economy has been ruined by the gambling and bumbling of the business sector. The government now has to spend trillions of dollars to bail out inefficient uncontrolled corporations out of their greedy blunders of the past 8 years.
You are not going to balance those trillions with a few bucks off the legislative salaries. Don’t you still get it? The so-called socialist government is actually SAVING the pompous and failed capitalist economy! If you don’t get it, then it just establishes the fact that our education system is weaker than we had suspected. The likes of you first need to learn elementary school math before you dabble in economic issues!
One wonders whom we have to turn to Save America now. The “three word appeals” with which everyone ends their speeches, whether Republican or Democratic, have not produced any results yet!
Adam: You have really made some misstatements. There are a lot of us out here who never wanted the bailouts. Let the chips fall where they may. Your comment about the streets is also in error. The streets in your apartment complex or residential subdivision are paid for by the developer and you remimburse him when the home is first sold. I will not deny some of the blame is with business, but excessive salaries like the correctional officers, rampant runaway spending, not living within budgets, lucrative pensions for police and fire(3% @ 50)also show that the goverment is far from not having any blame. So if you feel the goverment has not made it's share of blunders, I suggest you plan on attending elementary school as well. By the way, I believe it was in todays paper that it mentioned that CALPERS executives were paid bonuses for their performances and they lost billions for that agency!!!
Adam: Also if you had read more carefully it seems rather apparent to me that Mr. Doyle's comment was directed at state legislators, not employees, and you should consider apoligizing for your tirade.
Cutting legislators' salaries is a "feel good" notion wrought by small minds. While not wanting my comments viewed as an endorsement of this legislature, I think cutting their salaries will not get us better government. What will get us better government is voting out the liberals that view the taxpayer as a never-ending source of spoils to be dispensed to a favored few and for voters to understand that the role of government is not to dispense the favors in the first place. If anyone is to blame, it is the voters that put them there in the first place. Oh, but it's not politically correct to take responsibility for your own bad choices. We deserve what we get when we put them in office.
If Republican law makers are declining all perks and privileges for themselves, the wives and the kiddies, how come the votes went as they did? Don't bother, the question is rhetorical.
Jim,
Next time you leave your apartment complex, please stop when you reach the public streets, then the highways and freeways....If that is the extent of your debating capacity then I rest my case!
If the bailouts (started by the Bush administration, incidentally) were not there, and the giant machines of our economic sector were not buoyed up with tax dollars, who would have taken care of the millions of unemployed Americans...possibly you and I would have been among those unemployed.
And, using your logic (let the chips fall)I presume you and people like Mr. Doyle will vote against all the propositions the Governor is proposing to save the states finances. That will be a sad day indeed if Californians vote against 1-A to 1-F. Even if these are liberal ideas, they are American Liberal ideas.
Adam-
You've just given a perfect example of the wrong-headed thinking that created the fiscal emergency to begin with. The premise of your point is that we wouldn't have public roads or streets if the state couldn't confiscate our income. First, your point ignores the 800 lb gorilla of social spending in this state that has seen the largest growth over the years. The IHSS program is a perfect example of huge spending increases without any accountability and little benefit. The continued funding of a flawed public education system that produces almost as many dropouts as graduates, while programming liberal orhodoxy into the next generation dwarfs the spending on public roads and highways. One of the common denominators is the disproportionate influence of unions in both of these sectors of California's economy and their greed and thirst for power will eventually bankrupt us all. Second, the public roads and highways are paid for mostly by fuel taxes, so if you drive (or take public transportation) the benefit is paid directly by the user. By the way, the highway construction funds are regularly raided by the legislature to pay for more wrong-headed (but well-intentioned) social spending.
Adam, wake up!! The government at all levels is not the source of solutions. Unfortunately, at its best it is a necessary inconvenience. It should be used judiciously for a few essential functions and otherwise left on a shelf so it doesn't cause much damage.
This reminds me of a cafeteria I've been in before.
Adam: I guess I should have carried out my response on the strets further but I was answering directly your words. I thank KLK-42 for responding. My recollections of the bailouts showed support from Congress, mostly Democrats but also some Republicans, and I am not sure who thought of it first.
Also I have already voted no on 1A-1F and according tto the polls a lot of people arebecause they realize what it actually is.
I'm not so much about pay cuts, but I am all about doing the job. If the legislator does not vote or show up for the job every single meeting or committee day, he/she should be docked for the time not on the job and like an athlete, be made to pay a penalty. If absences are excessive he/she should be removed from the job.
Thanks, for asking us to comment.
Remember the saying 'what is good for the goose is good for the gander'? Well, if the economy is put in further jeopardy due to "personal interest dragging", those doing the "dragging" need TO FEEL THE SAME RESTRICTIONS being placed on the ones "they" failed and caused to have their livlihood shortchanged.
They are representatives not personal agenda advocates!