CT Progressive

Joe from the WFP directed my attention to the Maximum Wage Bill, HB 5077, which is being offered in the Connecticut State Legislature this year by Rep. Aresimowicz. The bill’s draft reads:

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives in General Assembly convened:

That the general statutes be amended to provide that eligibility for state economic assistance and tax expenditures for corporations be denied to such corporations whose chief executive officer earns more than twenty times the wage earned by such corporation’s lowest paid employee.

When I first heard about it, I smiled, and thought that a) it was an idea that wasn’t likely to go anywhere, and b) in particular would make executives seek out demotions to the vice-presidential position in their companies in a hurry.

But it seems like there may actually be some action on this front coming down on the Federal level. From Bloomberg:

White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said it’s “very safe” to assume that new rules guiding the administration’s financial rescue will address bonuses and executive pay.

Earlier today, Senate Democrats took the first step toward limiting pay for workers at companies receiving federal bailouts. Senator Claire McCaskill of Missouri introduced legislation to restrict compensation at such companies to $400,000, the equivalent of the U.S. president’s salary. Another measure being proposed would create a court to restrain executive compensation.

“We have a bunch of idiots on Wall Street that are kicking sand in the face of the American taxpayer” by taking multimillion-dollar bonuses, McCaskill said.

Companies have continued to award bonuses after accepting funds from the $700 billion taxpayer bailout enacted by Congress last year. The Treasury Department has injected about $200 billion into banks across the country through its Troubled Asset Relief Program. [...]

McCaskill’s Cap Executive Officer Pay Act would ban any director, executive or other employee of a company receiving bailout funds from receiving more than $400,000 a year in total compensation, including salary, bonuses and retirement contributions.

Man – now that’s what we elect Democrats for. And what’s really interesting is that this proposal is even more aggressive than the one proposed by Aresimowicz – bank tellers clock in a wage somewhere in the $12/hour range, so McCaskill would let them top off around 16X the wages of their front-line workers. And this bill seems to have Obama’s support.

Also of note from the Bloomberg article is a proposal from John Larson which will be a comfort to anyone who’s lived through the last eight years only to hear that this is not the time to look backwards or fix blame for the historically epic screwups that’ve taken place. Guess what – it is indeed the time to look backwards:

In the House, Democratic Caucus Chairman John Larson is proposing the creation of an independent commission to investigate the extent to which Wall Street abuses contributed to the economic crisis.

The commission would have 90 days to report back to lawmakers about regulatory, tax and other changes that should be considered. It also would examine derivative markets, mortgage- backed securities and other financial sectors to determine whether regulatory changes are needed.

“Did your regulatory agencies turn a blind eye to market manipulation and unethical behavior?” Larson, the fourth- ranking House Democratic leader, said in a statement. “Are new markets being monitored with outdated regulation? These are all questions the commission would answer.”

The panel would recommend a possible “investors’ bill of rights” designed to protect 401(k) retirement plans, pensions and other savings “from corporate greed and mismanagement,” he said.

There’s a new poll up on the AFT-CT website on the current budget, and it’s worth checking out. The poll, commissioned by a coalition of State employees unions, offers some good insight into broader public thinking on our economic situation, and how we ought to address the problems we’re facing. The links to the polling memo and presentation slides are at the bottom of the page linked above.

Seeing as we just wrapped up a big Presidential election year, I’m definitely feeling weary of polls as news items – especially since the research that a poll like this contains is unlikely to color future coverage of budget negotiations. I certainly won’t be holding my breath waiting for Rell’s proposals to be described as “the Governor’s unpopular cuts-only approach.” But still, poll-mania is simply the way of life – spicier and more objective-sounding than most press releases, paying the cost of a poll is just about the only way to guarantee your message gets into the papers. So good on SEBAC for releasing this for public consumption.

Some highlights:

Q42 I am going to read you several approaches they might be able to take in order to balance the state budget, and after I read the approaches, please tell me which approach would be your top choice for balancing the state’s budget.

And, illustrating that even goodwill for Rell personally can’t overcome the public’s preference for a revenue-based solution over Rell’s cut-based plan:

Rell’s Approach: Some leaders, including Governor Rell, say Connecticut must not raise taxes in this economic climate, and instead we must make deep cuts to state spending and focus government on the core services it should provide in order to balance the budget and address this shortfall. They say Connecticut is facing the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression and raising taxes now would hurt businesses and cost us needed jobs, making our economy even worse. They say we have to solve this budget crisis with spending cuts alone.

(SPLIT A) Shared Sacrifices Approach: Other legislative leaders say that we cannot balance the budget with spending cuts alone as they will damage the economy further, and we have to consider a combination of spending cuts and some increases in state taxes. They say there needs to be shared sacrifices by everyone, and the state should make cuts to a variety of public services, increase income tax rates for the wealthiest, as well as close corporate tax loopholes so we can protect those state services that are most vital.

(SPLIT B) Increase Revenue/No Cuts Approach: Other leaders in the state legislature, relying on Nobel Prize winning economists, say our economy has fallen into recession, and now is not the time to make drastic cuts to jobs and services which will only damage our economy further and put us deeper into recession. Rather, they say this is the time to bring about real structural change and reform to state government, while working to protect and improve public services like education, worker training and health care so we can create jobs and strengthen our economy. They propose balancing the budget by eliminating corporate tax loopholes that allow big corporations to pay less in taxes than middle-class families do, and increasing taxes on the wealthiest.

There’s been a stand-off for some time, while the Governor and the legislative Democrats waiting for the other to be the first to raise the issue of taxes in the current budget crisis. Well, the standoff is over:

More revenue translates into a bid for higher taxes - something House Speaker Christopher Donovan, D-Meriden, suggested earlier in the day during a radio interview on WNPR.

“The wealthy as well as the average person needs to kick in,” Donovan responded to one caller’s question about potential tax increases. Donovan has long been a fan of a so-called millionaires tax and is a strong supporter of organized labor. (Via Brian Lockhart)

Wyman said the governor and legislators eventually will have to admit that a combination of tax increases and spending cuts are inevitable.

“They’re going to have to tighten their belts, and they’re going to have raise taxes,” Wyman said. (Via Capitol Watch)

But while Rell is putting on the “working together” hat…

“It has been very difficult,” she said. “I will be honest. I’ll say that over and over again. It’s been a very difficult process. … It’s going to be time for all of us to come together [as leaders] and act. And I think they all agree. There aren’t any great options in this budget.”

… she turns around and shows that some pretty right-wing instincts are under that moderate facade:

“I’m looking at everything we’ve done as a state in years past — what worked, what didn’t,” Rell said. “And all of them are on the table. And some of them will be in the budget.”

But not taxes?

“No taxes,” she said.

As the economy has worsened and revenue collections have fallen far below what state analysts feared, Rell said she has been forced to return to budget cuts that she had initially rejected. Some cuts that she had viewed as “no way, no how” are now in the mix. (Via The Courant)

This… is crazy. Democratic leaders are talking about using the full toolkit available to the government, and gearing up for a mix of approaches to repair the State’s ailing economy, while Rell’s solution is to take a buzzsaw to the State government – a cuts-only budget.

The Democrats have proposed doing the increases – and will take the political hit for it – because they understand that the government does a lot of things that people genuinely rely on. Rell is talking about straight-up amputation, when surgery and medicine are what we really need. Let’s hope that she can stow her right-wing theatrics before the process plays out – and if she can’t, that the Democrats can put a sane balanced budget together over her opposition.

So, the Obama stimulus package, stripped down to win some Republican votes in Congress, won exactly zero Republican votes on the floor tonight.

That’s not a surprise: in fact, the only thing that’s surprising is that anyone would find it all that remarkable to begin with. It’s being written up everywhere, but I like Atrios’ take:

They’re a competing political party and they need to, you know, highlight the fact that their vision for America is actually different. I appreciate that members of both parties don’t always toe the line completely, but on a bill as big as this it makes perfect sense for it to play out as it did.

Of course the flip side is that Dems should’ve pushed the best plan that could pass the Senate instead of pushing some pointless fantasy about bipartisanship.

That “pointless fantasy” is of course alive in practically every nook and cranny of the Democratic Party: one State Rep that I was corresponding with recently cited “these non-partisan new times” as a reason to change some content on a Democratic website. My response was to say that I “hope Cafero and McKinney share your enlightened view when the end of the session comes around.”

But of course, they don’t, and at a certain point “hoping” for change to come is a lot less productive than using your political power (i.e. veto proof majorities) to simply make it happen. The reality is that, as it stands, the pretense of non-partisanship eats 90% of the time off of the clock, and by the time Democratic leadership is forced to get down to brass tacks, it’s relatively easy for the minority to just filibuster the rest of the majority’s legislative program away. It happens every time, and it’s utterly maddening.

Unless Connecticut’s State Legislators have some good reason to think the state budget process will go differently from the stimulus vote we just witnessed, they need to get their heads together and find the best plan that can get 24 votes in the Senate, and just make it happen. Yes, that gives whoever is likely to be that 24th vote more influence over the process than any of us might like, but that situation is going to be a lot better than negotiating away all of the priorities that 137 Democratic legislators just finished campaigning on, winding up with a mess, and taking 100% of the blame for it.

I noticed this a while back, but Colin McEnroe’s post brought it back to my attention: legislative staff salaries came out via an FOI request from Ken Dixon, and are viewable here.

Notable:

• House Democrats have $32K of staff costs per legislator.
• House Republicans have $70K of staff costs per legislator.
• Senate Democrats have $177K of staff costs per legislator.
• Senate Republicans have $213K of staff costs per legislator.

And fueling “McKinney Congressional Run” talk, angry former Shays staffer Brenda Kupchick has landed a job with the Senate Republican caucus. As the Republican caucuses keep shrinking, it’s notable whenever new staff come on, because the operation doesn’t really have any logical reason to expand – especially when the new staffers don’t come from the Hartford area, as most do.

So with that in mind, let me make a modest proposal: the legislature should establish a fixed per-legislator budget for the House and Senate caucus staffs, indexed to inflation (or, more entertainingly, to the current minimum wage). Caucuses should be able to allocate their staff budgets however they like – a few high-paid staffers, a vast army of low-paid ones, or anything in-between.

The current legislative salaries, if the FOI report is comprehensive, total up to $13.8 million. But setting a staff budget of $32,000 per House member and $177,000 per Senator would immediately save $2.5 million, and we’re looking for all the millions we can get in this difficult budget season.

---

UPDATE 1/28/09: Dixon posted the wages of the sessional employees as well, and if you total up the pay in each session (105 days in the odd-numbered years, 64 days in the even-numbered years), and divide by two for a yearly average, the staff costs change as follows:

• House Democrats have $32K $36.5K of staff costs per legislator.
• House Republicans have $70K $75.2K of staff costs per legislator.
• Senate Democrats have $177K $191.5K of staff costs per legislator.
• Senate Republicans have $213K $225.1K of staff costs per legislator.

The gap widens by about $2,000 per year on the House side, and closes by about $2,000 a year on the Senate side.

Working Families gets an editorial into the Advocate on the subject of Paid Sick Days.

I don’t have a lot to add, except that this is one area where the absence of Jim Amann is most noticeable: the bill passed the State Senate twice, only to be crushed by Speaker Amann at the last minute each time.

Reading down the list of coalition supporters of the bill, ConnSACS (Sexual Assault Crisis Center) jumped out at me as a unique partner – it turns out that in the 2008 and 2009 versions, allowing victims of sexual assault and stalking the ability to use paid sick leave to get medical or psychological services, to relocate, or to participate in court proceedings.

One less positive change from the 2007 version was a revision of those workplaces impacted by the law, changing from those with 15 or more employees in the 2007 version to 50 or more employees in 2008. That cuts most of the non-chain restaurants and retail operations out of the law, and one State Rep that I asked said that the provision made it easy for them to support, “since it wouldn’t impact any businesses in town that don’t already have” paid sick days.

You have to start someplace, I suppose – but it’s a shame that a compromise that failed to win over the conservative Dems last year has become the high-water mark for what we can achieve at all this year.

It’s a new legislative session, which means it’s time for the Senate Vacancy Law to come roaring back into style. Last year, legislative leaders downplayed expectations of the bill’s passage, but this year it’s looking much more favorable.

You can contact your State Reps and State Senators on the bill — currently known as H.B. 5829 and introduced by Rep. Tim O’Brien.

You can also contact the House and Senate leadership (House Speaker Donovan, Majority Leader Merrill, and Senate President Williams), as well as Government Administration and Elections chairs Gayle Slossberg and James Spallone.

Or, you can get your Town Committee to endorse this well-made resolution drafted up by the Hampton DTC, available below the fold.

(more…)