Repeal the prevailing wage law. Enact additional reforms to the unemployment and workers compensation systems, reforms that target cost drivers in both. Make Pennsylvania a right to work state by securing the right of employees to decide for themselves whether to join or financially support a union.
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Public Education
When he first took office, Governor Corbett walked into a public education funding gap. For over two years Pennsylvania’s school districts received a total of $1.7 billion in stimulus money. Over that same two-year period, public school employee salaries and benefits jumped by $1.3 billion.
Pensions
The unfunded liability for state employees and teacher pensions is $41 billion, and if something isn’t done soon we are on the hook for it. The Governor is offering a plan that will almost surely result in a tough political fight because part of it calls for adjusting the pension formulas of those currently employed. There may be no alternative. His budget office says that next fiscal year the costs for pensions will consume 60 percent of all new revenues, money that should be going to core government programs.
Over the next two weeks, the House and Senate Appropriations Committees will continue holding budget hearings on the proposed FY 2013-14 spending plan Governor Tom Corbett unveiled on February 5.
Here’s to trusting that when the hearings end on March 7, lawmakers conclude, as we have, that there’s a lot to like in the plan.
By: Dave Taylor, Executive Director, PMA
The Pennsylvania Manufacturers’ Association, and on behalf of Pennsylvania’s manufacturing employers, emphatically supports voluntary union membership and an end to coercive payments to unions in our commonwealth.
The 2013-14 legislative session, with 23 new lawmakers, began on January 1 under a constitutional requirement that swearing in occur the first Tuesday in January. The new members will have little time to adjust to the rules and routine as they will have to embrace transportation funding, liquor privatization, another tight budget, and we at PMA hope they will tackle key business issues left over from last year.
Manufacturing has a friend in Pennsylvania. The Governor’s Manufacturing Advisory Council (GMAC) has issued its report.
Prevailing Wage One of the Most Expensive Unfunded Mandates for Local Governments -- here's why!