By Ed Ring, August 30, 2013 Summary: During 2012 the Orange County Employee Retirement System, OCERS, collected $628 million from employees and employers to invest in their pension fund. Of this $628 million, $410 million was the so-called “normal contribution,” which was a payment to cover the present value of future pensions earned during 2012...

Here are links to the top stories available online over the past week reporting on union activity including legislation, financial impact, reform activism, etc., from California and across the USA. Union Support Of Minimum Wage Hike Is Self-Interested By Richard Berman, August 27, 2013, Investors Business Daily Mary Kay Henry, president of the Service Employees...

Something is bothering union leaders and lobbyists in California. A few unreconstructed troglodytes in the hinterlands still haven’t received the memo explaining how unions will lead the state in its evolution to a more Progressive society, under the firm but benevolent hand of government authority. The typical political, business, and community leader in California today...

Union bosses do — at the expense of good teachers, children, their parents and taxpayers.   In a tribute to Labor Day, the California Teachers Association has put up a slobbering web page as a paean to the labor movement. Its unintentionally humorous title is “Organized Labor – Proud and Free.” Free?  Actually, it is very...

Last month, the California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS) announced that it would post the names and pension amounts of its retirees. But after the Retired Public Employees Association of California (RPEA) objected, CalPERS quickly pulled back from this pledge. RPEA leaders made what amounted to a novel and troubling argument about why vital public...

By Joe Luppino-Esposito, August 9, 2013 About the Author:  Joe Luppino-Esposito is an editor and author at State Budget Solutions, focusing on public employee pensions, labor law, and state budget reforms. Prior to joining SBS, Joe was a researcher at the Center for Union Facts, and previously served as a Visiting Legal Fellow at the Heritage...

Among university professors, government planners and mainstream pundits there is little doubt that the best city is the densest one. This notion is also supported by a wide number of politically connected developers, who see in the cramming of Americans into ever smaller spaces an opportunity for vast, often taxpayer-subsidized, profiteering. More recently density advocates cite...

Editor’s Note:  This post by Michael Shedlock explains quite well why significantly increasing the minimum wage is a terrible idea. If the union’s new “Fight for Fifteen” (dollars per hour) campaign were successful, it would increase unemployment, and unleash a round of price inflation that would in-turn require government entitlement payments to increase. This is...

Big Labor bosses are facing the increasing realization that their organizations are rapidly facing extinction. A trifecta of difficulties, consisting of recent revelations of the impact Obamacare will have on union costs and membership, the weakening of support for “Card Check” legislation, and the increasing popularity and passage of “Right-to-Work” laws have the Gasping Dinosaurs very nervous. Union...