Workforce

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.

The only things standing in the way of the private management of the Pennsylvania Lottery are reviews by the Attorney General, Treasurer, and Auditor General. They each have 30 days to review Governor Tom Corbett’s decision to hand the administration of the Lottery over to Camelot Global Services. Their review is limited to the scope of their offices.

“The Attorney General reviews it for its legality, the Treasurer on its financials,” said Jay Pagni, a spokesman for the Department of General Services. “None can review on policy.”

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.

Lawmakers sworn in on January 1st to kick off the 2013-14 legislative session have an opportunity to act with no delay on a pro-growth agenda already vetted by industry, labor, and both political parties. The agenda was approved in August by the Governor’s Manufacturing Advisory Council (GMAC).