Bi-partisan budget deal.

[KAWDUP]

Winners and losers?

Think it will pass?

 

[JScottWriter]

Nope, those dumbasses in Congress couldn't pass anything.

 

[jswain]

Most likely pass.GOP concentrating on 2014 elections without budget/debt limit issues..Its all about Obamacare

 

[Michchamp]

apparently the biggest losers are public sector employees who will see their pensions gutted as one of the horse-trading provisions needed to get it to pass. great country we live in, eh?

most commentators I've read are like "meh, at least they didn't gut all the things DC insiders and the WSJ wanted them to gut, like Social Security, Medicare, etc." so I guess there's that.

 

[Michchamp]

Most likely pass.GOP concentrating on 2014 elections without budget/debt limit issues..Its all about Obamacare

it's funny... all the Republican congresspeople bitched about how hard it was to sign up for healthcare through the site (signing up for health insurance should apparently be less time consuming than turning on the tv...? why should you even have to enter your name and personal information... what a freaking nightmare!) yet they all did it, and they didn't bitch too much about the price or the benefits they got from doing it. I guess they weren't going to practice what they preach and go without it.

 

[KAWDUP]

apparently the biggest losers are public sector employees who will see their pensions gutted as one of the horse-trading provisions needed to get it to pass. great country we live in, eh?

most commentators I've read are like "meh, at least they didn't gut all the things DC insiders and the WSJ wanted them to gut, like Social Security, Medicare, etc." so I guess there's that.

I found it interesting that the Republicans seemed to get the most "new" provisions that favored them. It actually lowers the deficit without raising obvious taxes, yet they said the biggest opposition was likely to be the conservative wing of the party. Go figure.

Just goes to show what a huge job lies ahead of them for any "change" in the balance of power.

Just to set up another argument with you, though, I have to disagree with one thing - their pensions weren't "gutted" - they will just cost a bit more. Closer to what % you and I contribute for them. Used to be horse-trading was the only way legislation got done - I'd actually welcome some of it, as opposed to the stupid grid-lock we have had lately.

 

[Michchamp]

I found it interesting that the Republicans seemed to get the most "new" provisions that favored them. It actually lowers the deficit without raising obvious taxes, yet they said the biggest opposition was likely to be the conservative wing of the party. Go figure.

Just goes to show what a huge job lies ahead of them for any "change" in the balance of power.

Just to set up another argument with you, though, I have to disagree with one thing - their pensions weren't "gutted" - they will just cost a bit more. Closer to what % you and I contribute for them. Used to be horse-trading was the only way legislation got done - I'd actually welcome some of it, as opposed to the stupid grid-lock we have had lately.

I think it's more important to understand the real dynamic behind the scenes...

most dems and republicans are probably indistinguishable when it comes to budgetary issues; then you have a handful of actual liberals on the left who would fight for less corporate pork & higher taxes on them, and the somewhat higher number of the real Tea Party hardcores on the right who lobby for no government whatsoever, except an army, federal prisons & the "drug war."

and as far as the pension thing goes, I guess it's a drop in the bucket, but there aren't enough federal employees (the actual ones that do the work, not politicians that leave in a couple years to make high six figure salaries lobbying) to really stand up for themselves.

those worried about "automatic spending" could gaze at the new requirements for federal employees to pay more of their own money into pensions. That would add up to $6 billion for federal employees, $6 billion for military members.
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link.

And one of the major ?pay-fors? is an increase in federal employee pension contributions. President Obama?s 2014 budget included such a proposal, which would have raised the employee contribution in three stages, from 0.8 percent of salary to 2 percent. Congress had already made this shift for new hires; the Obama proposal would affect all workers hired before 2012.
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A small pay cut doesn?t sound like much. But you have to add that to the pile of hits federal workers have taken over the past several years. Government pay has been frozen since January 2010. The only way you?ve gotten a raise over the last four years if you work for the government is if you received a promotion or a similar advance. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that this has reduced the purchasing power of a government salary by over 7 percent since 2010. The deal to avoid the government shutdown in October finally broke this fever with a 1 percent pay raise starting in January. This budget deal would wipe much of that out.
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it's maybe not that big of a deal. I'm curious how much corporate welfare was affected by the budget. I'm guessing not at all, despite Paul Ryan's claims, which means people that lobby for free money and tax cuts aren't affected, but people that make federal salaries ($17K - $129K) are.

 

[Gulo Blue]

More a statement about the Detroit situation than this budget, but cutting pensions that have already been earned to fulfill debts to lenders is immoral as hell. And I mean paying an investor one dime when pensions are less than 100% funded. Like the Toledo War, all the right is on one side and all the political power on the other.

 

[Michchamp]

More a statement about the Detroit situation than this budget, but cutting pensions that have already been earned to fulfill debts to lenders is immoral as hell. And I mean paying an investor one dime when pensions are less than 100% funded. Like the Toledo War, all the right is on one side and all the political power on the other.

yep.

it's pretty absurd.

and it's dismissed by people who say "Yeah, but the people voted for those politicians who gutted the pensions by spending the money on other stuff."

I don't know why that argument is supposed to hold any water... as it rests upon a lot of falsehoods and assumptions, but the people who say that are usually stupid, or are getting paid by the banks who benefit from gutting those pensions to pay their own debts more fully.

the idea that banks maybe should've not lent money to a city that needed to raid their pension funds for spending cash in the first place, or funnel campaign money & support to politicians that promised to do so, is apparently not worthy of including in the discussion.

 

[KAWDUP]

. . . is apparently not worthy of including in the discussion.

All evidence to the contrary.

 

[tinselwolverine]

More a statement about the Detroit situation than this budget, but cutting pensions that have already been earned to fulfill debts to lenders is immoral as hell. And I mean paying an investor one dime when pensions are less than 100% funded. Like the Toledo War, all the right is on one side and all the political power on the other.

These types of employees should have it made up to them by having the government assign them owner of federal property tracts in Alaska.

 

[Michchamp]

All evidence to the contrary.

the press seems to be focusing on pensions being underfunded, not on the causes to it, or asking who should bear the pain from the underfunded pensions.

most sources tend to bury the detail that the avg. pension in Detroit is $19,000 per year.

This is it... this is what was too generous and needs to be cut. Orr and the banks he (his law firm...) represents wants the judge to cut the pensions of retirees collecting peanuts so they can get fully paid on the billions they're owed.

What would Jesus do, KAWDUP?

 

[Michchamp]

in chicago, the Tribune, SunTimes, local Fox Affiliate etc. are making front page news of the fact that Moodys & Standard & Poors raised the city's bond rating after Illinois' congress voted for the bill to gut workers' pensions here.

No mention of the conflict of interest of Moody's & S&P with regard to the Banks that fund them, or mention that Moody's & S&P's easily manipulated ratings were a key part of the 2008 financial crises...

 

[Gulo Blue]

A lot of people don't realize that back when these pensions were being earned, the salaries that went with them were lower than public sector salaries for comparable jobs. That was the deal; lower salary your entire career, rock-solid retirement plan.

 

[Michchamp]

A lot of people don't realize that back when these pensions were being earned, the salaries that went with them were lower than public sector salaries for comparable jobs. That was the deal; lower salary your entire career, rock-solid retirement plan.

I think you mean lower than private sector salaries.

right.

and lost in decades of Tea Party and "small government" or "government = baaad" rhetoric is the fact that experience showed certain functions had to be done by government, and in order to attract competent people and get them to do their jobs well, you had to offer the people who did them a decent salary and compensation so they would stay with the position long term & get experience doing it.

that's just common sense right?

Here's a picture of KAWDUP's friends saying "Durrrrr... we don need no meat inspections. Why is we paying some fancy gov'ment know-it-all more than cousin Merle makes ridin' mud bikes at the county fair to do a job like that, uh-huh, durrrrr."

(No, they're not all hicks... some of these people are quite bright and well-educated, I'm sure. just look at them...)

 

[Thumb]

I like the sign on the rear left that says" "Mr. Obaba your not my daddy".

LOL who needz skoolin anyhow.

 

[KAWDUP]

the press seems to be focusing on pensions being underfunded, not on the causes to it, or asking who should bear the pain from the underfunded pensions.

most sources tend to bury the detail that the avg. pension in Detroit is $19,000 per year.

This is it... this is what was too generous and needs to be cut. Orr and the banks he (his law firm...) represents wants the judge to cut the pensions of retirees collecting peanuts so they can get fully paid on the billions they're owed.

What would Jesus do, KAWDUP?

Jesus would smite you down for using His name in vain. As far as everything else, man's free will would rule.

. . . or didn't they teach you that in Sunday school?

 

[KAWDUP]

Here's a picture of KAWDUP's friends saying . . .

Unless you are looking for a battle of words of what this even means, and why I would care, you might re-think your statement.

I guess I could start by picking any old stupid looking crowd pic of socialists and communists and attach your name to it to be what . . . funny?

. . . or you could just stop being a dick - up to you.

 

[Gulo Blue]

I think you mean lower than private sector salaries.

right.

Oops. Yes. That's what I meant.

 

[Michchamp]

I don't think Jesus smote people; that was the god of the old testament. he got a lot nicer and more merciful in the new testament, sort of, until you get to that really trippy book of revelation part.