As legislators ponder which taxes will be raised to plug the $2.8 billion budget hole, the issue of just how much of the budget state employees gobble up (60%) won’t go away.   

It’s a tough pill to swallow that we all will have to fork over more in taxes to pay state workers when those state workers earn better salary and benefits, for fewer days worked, than most of us chumps toiling in the private sector.  And it doesn’t help knowing over 20,000 of those state workers are in line to receive a 5% pay hike this year.   

But labor unions have made sure there is no talk of cutting state worker salaries or benefits, or reducing the generous number of paid days off they receive.  Instead we hear talk of cutting vital services to the elderly as their advocates parade them around warning these vulnerable members of our society will be left defenseless.  We hear talk of cutting children from the state’s subsidized health plan and the horror stories of sick kids who won’t receive the medical care they need.  And then there is the talk of cutting funding for higher education that will leave students unable to afford college. 

All these terrible decisions about what services to ax, but not a word about reining in the out-of-control compensation paid to state workers.  Heck, forget buying Lotto tickets, we should all just try to land cushy state jobs.  That’s the real winning ticket. 

Of course, if you listen to the tripe offered up by the state worker labor union, you’d think state workers are underappreciated, overworked public servants who barely scrape by.  Heck, from the sounds of it, they barely do better than someone on welfare and food stamps.   

The truth is, of course, quite a bit different from the picture painted by the union.  There is a reason compensation for state employees makes up 60% of the budget—and it isn’t because they are under-paid. 

In the interest of helping the public make an informed decision about whether the Legislature should increase taxes to fix the budget deficit, BIAW has created a tool that tracks state workers’ salaries and benefits.  Use this resource to help determine whether YOU should have to make do with less so that state workers don’t have to.