"And it was inevitable that some of these people pushed back..."
Ray Bradbury, The Martian Chronicles.
Big time union bosses just may have pushed top far. Will the decent people (Yes, we have them here) finally push back?
The sweetheart Illinois union pension deal, a bipartisan stink-bomb from 20 years ago, just might serve as a long overdue fire alarm for the residents of the Land of Lincoln.
From an editorial, "Yes, this is corrupt," that begins on the front page of the Sunday Chicago Tribune:
This is yet another classic saga of how Illinois power brokers take from the many to line the pockets of a chosen few. Legislators awarding free tuition at state universities to the children of their contributors, school boards inflating superintendents' late-career salaries to raise their pension calculations, politicians awarding one another pensions for part-time jobs — like those three traditional scams, this pension-rigging for union officials fits the definition of "corrupt": contaminated, morally unsound, debased, venal.$20 billion underfunded? Surprised? You shouldn't be.
Calculating labor leaders' city pensions on their union salaries means Liberato "Al" Naimoli, president of Cement Workers Union Local 76, draws an annual city pension of $157,752 for a city job that paid him $15,264 a year. Then there's Dennis Gannon, former president of the Chicago Federation of Labor. He resigned from his city job, which topped out at $55,474, in 1993. But, because an accommodating Chicago City Hall rehired him for one day in 1994, he's drawing a city pension of $158,258.
Was this legal?
If you haven't read the Wednesday and Thursday news stories in which the Tribune's Jason Grotto explained how city and state lawmakers enabled these outrages, you'll find them at chicagotribune.com/pensions. Fascinating reads, don't miss them.
Grotto's stories may expose the tip of a deep and wide iceberg. There are indications that this pathology — taxpayer-funded pensions based on huge union salaries — extends well beyond 23 labor leaders from Chicago. We hope members of the affected unions note that, on average, these privileged few have accrued pension benefits nearly three times what typical retired city workers receive. Those workers ought to be furious that their leaders are raiding their funds. Just as taxpayers should be furious about union bosses depleting city pension coffers that are underfunded by $20 billion or more.
Last year Gannon, while he was still the boss of the Chicago Federation of Labor, gave a speech in front of the Willis Tower promoting an anti-bank bailout march. He bellowed, "They got theirs, where is ours?"
As far as pensions, Gannon, you and your cronies got yours.
Legendary Chicago newspaper columnist Mike Royko often mused that Chicago's official slogan should be Ubi Est Mea. "Where's mine?"
Related posts:
NLRB overreach, Chicago pension edition
More on Illinois' outrageous union pensions
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