To varying degrees, all states have the same challenges. They have short-term problems such as rising Medicaid costs and a recession-induced drop in tax revenue. They also face looming bills from their health and retirement programs for public employees.
But Walker's tactics are the most aggressive among the governors attacking the problems, and perhaps the most political.
The financial parts of his plan are reasonable and fair, even modest. He is asking that workers increase what they pay for their healthcare to 12.6% of the cost of their plans, only about half what most private sector workers pay — if they have insurance at all. He's also asking public employees who are part of the Wisconsin Retirement System to pay 5.8% of their salaries as pension costs. Currently, they pay little or nothing into a system that allows them to retire as early as 55 (50 for police and firefighters) without penalty.
If anything, Walker's fiscal plan does not go far enough. Public employee benefits in Wisconsin will still be wildly out of line with those of private sector workers. Moreover, he would exempt police, firefighters and some other emergency workers, tainting his credibility since they backed him in the last election.
Both the teachers and the Democrats (who are in hiding in Illinois) say they'll accept the cuts. The battle instead is focused on Walker's complex effort to crimp collective bargaining for non-emergency public sector workers.
So is Walker's effort a political move to clip the wings of organized labor, which is now more than 50% composed of government workers, who tend to vote for Democrats? Or is it a fiscally prudent step to weaken the ability of powerful public sector unions to use the political process to help choose the people on the other side of the bargaining table?
I believe that the answer to both questions is yes.
Regardless of motivation, Walker is dealing with the legacy created by spineless or shortsighted public officials who created massive liabilities to satisfy an important constituency. His state is debating tough steps toward fiscal responsibility that most other states and the federal government are so far refusing to take.
The governor might not be helping his cause by adding a political agenda to the fiscal one. But one way or another, the reckoning is coming, it's going to be ugly, and it's not confined to Madison