You can blame the unions and public employees if you want to. But when there's only one group of people that can feel remotely secure in their employment, I have a hard time taking them to task.
At every level, the call is for concessions. Teachers should forego raises, union contracts must be renegotiated, city workers need to sacrifice benefits. The story in Bridgeport City Hall is the same one in the state Capitol. The inference is that public employees are feeding off the rest of us, and it's time to take it back.
No doubt there are some lazy, good-for-nothing public employees who are wasting time and money. But there isn't a workplace in America that can't say that.
There are changes that should and likely will be made to make the system fairer and more transparent. But a crisis like this brings outbursts against the very idea of collective bargaining, and the protections only available to a lucky few. It's a system that treats workers as disposable that needs reform, not the one that offers a safety net.
Today, in businesses across the nation, people who work for a living watch grim-faced executives hold daylong, closed-door sessions secure in the knowledge they aren't talking about anything good. The jobs shed so far haven't slowed the economic plunge, so everyone knows worse is coming. And it could be any day.
Meanwhile, people who have been able to negotiate a modicum of security over the years are held up for ridicule. The autoworkers are blamed for Detroit's troubles, much like homeowners are said to be responsible for the mortgage crisis.
Surely some people took advantage of the housing bubble, and took what they could and ran. But most people didn't. A mortgage is like any contract; it has two parties, and usually only one is well versed in how the system works. If a lot of people ended up borrowing beyond their means, it was often because they believed the hype about all-powerful markets.
So now, in a situation where the news gets grimmer day by day, in one industry after another, we're told to take out our anger on the one group of people lucky enough to enjoy some security. Organized labor exerts only a fraction of the influence it once had in this country. But it's no coincidence that the only people it still covers are those best equipped to ride out this economy.
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Missing in the debate about Jim Calhoun and his salary is the question of the performers themselves, and what they are worth. The coach is the mainstay -- the only link between the greats of years' past and the current product. But no one pays to see Calhoun roam the sidelines, entertaining as that can be.
It's the players who produce the value. Without them, there's nothing. But of the billions of dollars spent in this country on college sports and their marketing, they end up with a pittance.
An athletic scholarship is not to be minimized -- a lot of people would pay dearly for the opportunities it can provide. But at a total value of, say, $120,000 over four years, it doesn't come close to matching the value produced by even an average player on a successful team.
If the coach is paid $1.6 million a year, how much is the point guard worth?
Some players will go on to successful basketball careers after college, a (very) few of them in the NBA. But for many, this is it. They fuel a multibillion-dollar enterprise and see the equivalent of a few pennies tossed their way. If they find a way to profit and get caught, they risk being banned from the sport.
The solution is uncertain, but people who make big money in this business should hope the players never organize themselves.
Hugh S. Bailey is assistant editorial page editor at the Connecticut Post. He can be reached at 330-6233 or at hbailey@ctpost.com.
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