Is Robert Davis helping or hurting Detroit ?

[EastsideAl]

I think there's a need for a Robert Davis, particularly at this moment of great peril. I just wish we had a better Robert Davis than Robert Davis.

[Hypestyles]

bizarre. We'll see what happens, but for now it's one more example of confirmation for all the folks who hate urban Detroit on principle and who feel that "everyone" is on the take or criminally incompetent. It's sad that many in "activism" pay lip service to looking out for vulnerable populations then on the side they're mainly about self-aggrandizement.. Activism as a "hustle" more than it is a true vocation..

[corktownyuppie]

I have very little patience for extremist views on the far left or on the far right, other than that it serves as a barometer for some deep-seeded passions on all sides.

What frustrates me about the far left activists in Detroit is not their opinions. It's the void of any quality leaders or communicators. In contrast, I've found that dialogue on this forum with opposing views has created a shift in my own understanding of the situation as ideas get exchanged, influenced, mixed with other ideas, transformed, etc.

Did I agree with what Robert Davis was doing? No. Do I agree with his positions? No. But people like him do serve a role in the public discourse, advocating for and sharing the mindset of a segment of people who are sometimes marginalized and poorly understood.

And, of course, when presented with complex problems, multiple facets of understanding are usually necessary to evolve your thinking to a point where solutions are possible.

But when the representatives of these people are the JoAnn Watsons, Malik Shabazzes, and the Robert Davis's of the world...then all of their credibility and any shred of valuable information or insight they share gets thrown out with the bathwater.

IMHO, the tragedy of the politics in Detroit is not the abundance of extremist leaders on the left. It's the abysmal quality of the leadership they bring to the table.

[Detwa]

This was one of the articles from almost a year ago today:

http://www.insidehamtramck.com/2011/...ere-did-it-go/

[EastsideAl]

I have very little patience for extremist views on the far left or on the far right, other than that it serves as a barometer for some deep-seeded passions on all sides.

What frustrates me about the far left activists in Detroit is not their opinions. It's the void of any quality leaders or communicators.

I've aired my general unhappiness with Robert Davis above. But I certainly wouldn't have thought that supporting the right of workers to organize and collectively bargain in their interests, or the enforcement of the mutually agreed upon contracts that result from that bargaining, as anything like an "extremist" view.

[corktownyuppie]

I've aired my general unhappiness with Robert Davis above. But I certainly wouldn't have thought that supporting the right of workers to organize and collectively bargain in their interests, or the enforcement of the mutually agreed upon contracts that result from that bargaining, as anything like an "extremist" view.

It's not the supporting of workers or bargaining rights that I find extreme. It's some of the edgy stuff like, "Roy Roberts should have no legal authority because he never actually took the oath." I mean, ok, I get it...pursue every possible legal strategy, but I view those things the same way I view Matty Moroun's 5-year saga to find every possible legal avenue to delay an inevitable ending....while wasting valuable resources and everyone's time and energy in the process.

But you are right, it's unfair for me to put him in the same category of JoAnn Watson as far as incendiary speech.

[Scottathew]

Robert Davis claims that the charges are in retaliation for his lawsuits. However, this investigation pre-dates all of his activism.

This is my take on it now:

Davis is in trouble, he knows it. The Feds have raided his house. What's his best defense? Conspiracy theory + racial pandering.

So how does he accomplish this? By filing a bunch of lawsuits and perhaps almost changing Detroit's history along the way. He gains a lot of followers for his trying to "stick it to the man". He also creates a false-motivation for "the man" to want to fight back.

I agree with others, he deserves a trial, but of course if he's guilty of the charges, I hope it costs him the prime of his life.

[Detwa]

Interesting point, 48091. Prior to any of this, he was only active in HP, on the school board, and he got into the routine of filing charges against opponents of him there. Then last year he jumped into the Wayne County mess, and then Detroit's EM proposal. I'd never thought about it being strategic.

I don't understand why people do any of this stuff. I had to go to court one time in my life and I was shaking like Don Knotts and started crying and choking when I had to get up to speak, lol. I swore I would never ever ever do anything wrong [[or let anything else go unattended to) again in my lifetime! That was the worst experience ever and I felt like everybody was looking at me and judging me, even though they were in there for far worse. Horrible, horrible. I don't get how people just do things and go to court like going to the grocery store. I'd rather have surgery than go to court again!

[JBMcB]

I don't understand why people do any of this stuff. I had to go to court one time in my life and I was shaking like Don Knotts and started crying and choking when I had to get up to speak, lol.

Like any other somewhat complicated and arcane system, you just need to know the basics of how things work.

Here's a fantastic story on This American Life about a guy in New Orleans who, with a rudimentary grasp of the law, kept messing with people who were buying foreclosed homes he owned - or claimed to own. [[Note, this guy isn't a hero, he screwed with families legitimately trying to buy new homes, for no apparent reason other than he had nothing better to do.)

http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/409/held-hostage?act=2

[Wesley Mouch]

I've aired my general unhappiness with Robert Davis above. But I certainly wouldn't have thought that supporting the right of workers to organize and collectively bargain in their interests, or the enforcement of the mutually agreed upon contracts that result from that bargaining, as anything like an "extremist" view.

Residents didn't democratically 'mutually agree upon' the contracts. It was between labor and bureaucracy.

[EastsideAl]

Residents didn't democratically 'mutually agree upon' the contracts. It was between labor and bureaucracy.

I'm not going to argue with you too much because I know you're adamantly anti-labor and would be just as happy to see a return to 70 hour work weeks, no worker safety protections, and child labor.

But just to point out that all of the city's labor contracts have to be approved by the City Council and the Mayor, who are, like or or not, the duly elected representatives of the people - and are not "bureaucrats." That's generally how representative democracy works. I'm not sure how else you'd propose to have contracts approved.

[Scottathew]

I'm not going to argue with you too much because I know you're adamantly anti-labor and would be just as happy to see a return to 70 hour work weeks, no worker safety protections, and child labor.

People who are "anti-labor" don't want what you've stated.

We want fair compensation at market prices as well as accountability. Unions are not compatible with that.

Why should public workers get paid so much more than private sector and also be virtually un-fireable? Why do private workers have to save for their retirement but union workers get their retirements on the backs of taxpayers? When we lay people off in the public sector, why do we have to do it by seniority instead of by performance?

Unions reward longevity. Private sector rewards performance.

[SteveJ]

48091... You are so wrong on everything. Public workers tend to make less when you compare education levels. A lot of public workers have 401k. Public workers don't get those GM 7k bonus checks every year. A lot of myths in your post and that you are passing on as truth. Also, check out how privatizing works in government. It ends up costing more because a political friend is hired to take over for example tech support for computers. They pay the worker $15 hour, the government gets charged $125 hour and it goes in the owners pocket. Don't be fooled by all the privatization in government hype. Its all a scam.

[EastsideAl]

People who are "anti-labor" don't want what you've stated.

They may not want them, but those things will be [[and to some extent already are) the result of their efforts. As they were in our history before organized labor grew and gained the strength to campaign against such things.

Why should public workers get paid so much more than private sector and also be virtually un-fireable? Why do private workers have to save for their retirement but union workers get their retirements on the backs of taxpayers? When we lay people off in the public sector, why do we have to do it by seniority instead of by performance?

First of all, much of what you say is false. As Steve points out, if you control for education levels, public sector workers actually make less than those in the private sector. Public workers also pay into their own pension funds and they would not retire "on the backs of the taxpayers," as you put it, if city and state governments had not raided those pension funds to pay for other things.

As for the rest of that paragraph, again, a little historical perspective is in order. Most non-management private sector workers once had the things you describe: they received retirement pensions, were protected against capricious dismissal and punishment, and followed a seniority system for layoffs, etc. But that was when the unionization rate for all workers in the U.S. was over 40% [[much closer to what it is in the rest of the industrialized world), and, perhaps more importantly, there was a wide public and governmental [[and, often, corporate) consensus that rights, protections, and decent wages for regular working people mattered and were part of being a fair and prosperous country.

The world you describe above is the result of a 30+ year concerted political and corporate campaign to undermine, destabilize, and destroy not only organized labor, but the rights and protections afforded to American workers at all levels. A campaign that has only accelerated in the past few years. So the real problem isn't what public workers get, it's what the rest of the American workforce doesn't get.

We want fair compensation at market prices

And I'm always curious when I see formulations like this - exactly who sets these magic "market prices"? And why is a organized group of workers negotiating the price and conditions of their labor any less a market mechanism than any other price setting negotiation?

I'm always confused why the free market crowd is in love with all other kinds of price setting negotiations, but when it comes to workers organizing to negotiate their price with their employers [[who are most often an organized corporation or governmental entity themselves) it's suddenly beyond the pale and a threat to some sort of freedom.

[Scottathew]

I'm married to a teacher, so lets take them for example.

A school year is 180 working days.

Her day is about 8a-3p. This includes a lunch and a prep hour. We will throw in an extra hour per school day for phone calls and grading papers at home, so we'll call it 7 hour day and pay her to eat.

7 hours x180 days = 1,260 work hours
We'll calculate annual salary off of the low end of what a teacher might make somewhere in his or her probationary period, $40,000.

$40,000/1260 = $31.75 an hour for an inexperienced teacher. PLUS a pension too! PLUS they have benefits where they don't even understand what a deductible is, they only have co-pays and they will picket if you threaten to raise their copays.

Now if we calculate that out for a more experienced teacher that has their masters+15\30 [[or whatever it is for the individual district):

$70,000 / 1260 = $55.00 an hour!

If you want to say that teachers put in more time than that, we can even add a couple hours to the day [[but don't forget, they do get a prep period for grading papers, etc...)

9 hours X 180 days = 1620 hours

70,000 / 1620 = $43 an hour + bennies + pension


So just a quick example here, being a teacher is a very lucrative opportunity. Yes, teachers work hard. Yes, they deserve to be paid. Yes, they are educated, skilled, and dedicated.

However, I dare to say that they are drastically overpaid.

[JBMcB]

And why is a organized group of workers negotiating the price and conditions of their labor any less a market mechanism than any other price setting negotiation?

There is nothing incompatible with labor organizing under a free market system. The problem comes in when they get special protections - such as forcing everyone at a company to be in a union, or not being able to fire striking workers.

If compensation is that terrible, striking workers shouldn't need protection when striking. If the company can find workers willing to work under those terms, then the union is keeping compensation artificially high.

[SteveJ]

First of all, most government workers aren't allowed to strike. I think teachers are the exception.

Second of all, you send your kid to get educated, to learn how to read, write, socialize, etc.. basically all of that and you think that teachers are overpaid. Sorry buddy, but you can't just think of everything as hourly pay. You can't put a price on a child learning to read and write and be prepared as an adult. The last thing that I would want is to send my kid to some minimum wage school in order to save money. Teachers probably make the biggest impact on society.

[Scottathew]

Second of all, you send your kid to get educated, to learn how to read, write, socialize, etc.. basically all of that and you think that teachers are overpaid. Sorry buddy, but you can't just think of everything as hourly pay. You can't put a price on a child learning to read and write and be prepared as an adult. The last thing that I would want is to send my kid to some minimum wage school in order to save money. Teachers probably make the biggest impact on society.

Minimum wage? HAH! Are you able to comprehend exactly how polar opposite a teacher that starts off at $35,000, and ends somewhere around $70,000-$80,000, PLUS bennies, PLUS a pension is from minimum wage?

Under your thinking no matter how much we pay a teacher it wouldn't be enough. That's the "IT'S OUR KIDS!" justification, and it's a bunch of bull.

If you were to ask me how to make their pay correct, I'd say take away the free retirement [[for all new teachers, existing ones are relying on it) and keep the salary the same.

I would take home a lot more money if I didn't put 20% of each of my paychecks into my 401k for my retirement. I don't get a pension yet I'm still very dedicated to the company I work for. I feel that I very much deserve what I get, and that my company very much deserves the effort that I put forth.

[Zacha341]

Just wanted to weign in on the salary quote. Public education teachers here in Detroit area mainly get into the higher $50K+ ranges after and if they aquire a Masters and Master plus education, along with full certification and additional specialized training.

Minimum wage? HAH! Are you able to comprehend exactly how polar opposite a teacher that starts off at $35,000, and ends somewhere around $70,000-$80,000, PLUS bennies, PLUS a pension is from minimum wage?

[Scottathew]

Just wanted to weign in on the salary quote. Public education teachers here in Detroit area mainly get into the higher $50K+ ranges after and if they aquire a Masters and Master plus education, along with full certification and additional specialized training.

True, that's why a lot of teachers, including my wife, get their masters. Matter of fact, my wife got her masters in her mid-20's so we could maximize her pay over her career.

Here's a DPS salary schedule: http://www.nctq.org/docs/22-07_6853.pdf

It shows teachers without a masters degree getting 53,369 at step 9, and 60,208 at step 10. Throw in a masters degree, and you make 70,046 at step 10.

I think these numbers would all be very fair numbers, if they weren't provided a pension until the day they die as well.

Pensions are bankrupting are schools, our cities, and are a great financial burden on our state as well.

It may sound like I have some kind of venom toward teachers, I assure you, I do not. I think they work hard and deserve to be paid fairly. However, I think the pensions they receive are unfair to the taxpayers, the majority of which have to do their own retirement planning.

[SteveJ]

Pensions are a great tool. They provide loyalty and some kind of financial stability for someone in their later years. The system we have now is basically a gamble with the way stocks have been going the last 10 years. Putting your money in the bank, you get a whopping .25% interest rate. I wish I had a pension but I'm not going to berate people that do. I berate the people who own the companies you work at who pay you scraps and he lives in a 4500 sq ft house in Birmingham and keeps telling how much more you need to sacrifice so he can squeeze more money out of you. That is the downfall of our country. Greed.

[Scottathew]

Pensions are a great tool. They provide loyalty and some kind of financial stability for someone in their later years. The system we have now is basically a gamble with the way stocks have been going the last 10 years. Putting your money in the bank, you get a whopping .25% interest rate. I wish I had a pension but I'm not going to berate people that do. I berate the people who own the companies you work at who pay you scraps and he lives in a 4500 sq ft house in Birmingham and keeps telling how much more you need to sacrifice so he can squeeze more money out of you. That is the downfall of our country. Greed.

Actually, greed, aka incentive, is the cornerstone of the American economy. If you own a company, you've taken a great gamble, have built something from nothing, and as a result, you're wealthy!

Greed is financial motivation, and is why most people do things. Financial motivation is why I work. Financial motivation is why teachers teach. Financial motivation is why UAW workers sweat it out on the line. Greed is why the American economy hums along.

A lack of greed and motivation is why countries like Greece implode as most of its population sits idle and collects government benefits starting in their early 50's.

My wife and I will benefit from her pension. It will provide us a great source of income when we retire. However, look at the consequences. The city that I live in is about to go bankrupt, in part, because of pensions. The auto industry and a huge part of our local economy almost went away, in part, because of pensions.

In my opinion, employers [[public or private) should never have to pay for people that aren't working. The people who are working should be compensated fairly.

People who are in unions are hard working people. They work in many industries that keep America humming along. However, pensions need to go away completely. They are not compatible with financial solvency.


As to the instability and insecurity of a 401k, that is in part true. When you're young and my age your 401k should be in mostly a blend of stocks. When you're older and my mom's age, your 401k should be in much less risky investments, such as bonds. The 401K I use, the Fidelity Freedom, automatically changes your investments to less risky ones gradually as you get closer to retirement.

[corktownyuppie]

Pensions are a great tool. They provide loyalty and some kind of financial stability for someone in their later years. The system we have now is basically a gamble with the way stocks have been going the last 10 years. Putting your money in the bank, you get a whopping .25% interest rate. I wish I had a pension but I'm not going to berate people that do. I berate the people who own the companies you work at who pay you scraps and he lives in a 4500 sq ft house in Birmingham and keeps telling how much more you need to sacrifice so he can squeeze more money out of you. That is the downfall of our country. Greed.

I'm a financial advisor, and I don't want to cross the line and dispense anything can be called "advice" for fear of a swift backhand from my compliance department. That said, a few generalities:

[[1) I agree that pensions in that they provide loyalty and stability in your later years. That statement, however, is one-sided in that it states all the benefits of pensions without stating any of the costs to give those benefits. So its weight in the argument is limited.

[[2) When you say "the system we have now is basically a gamble", the implication is that this system is somehow new. It's not new. For the last 2,000 years, save the last 150 for a few of us and then the last 75 for more of us, the system we have now WAS the only system we had. There was no such thing as you just stopped working and expected to be able to survive. Now in working toward a utopian ideal, I agree that our elders should not have to work to survive. But how we make that happen is a whole other question.

[[3) When social security was first introduced, you didn't receive benefits until your mid-60s. But life expectancy was in your late 50s. Which means that 50% of the population was never expected to get social security, and for those that did, it was inconceivable to receive it for 10 years, let alone 20-30 years. When Ford introduced "30-years-and-out", no one expected it was going be "30-years-of-work for 60-years-of-pay". Which is why so many of our municipal institutions are in trouble, social security is in trouble, medicare is in even more trouble, and corporate pension plans are severely underfunded.

So when I say that unions should no longer receive pension plans, it's not because I'm against unions, nor is it because I'm against pension plans. It's because the cost to offer these benefits to employees are invisible yet enormous.

Perhaps I should re-state my position. I'm neither for nor against pension plans. However, in any negotiation, the salary that should be negotiated should not be the annual salary or hourly wage. The number discussed on the table should be the total municipal or corporate employee cost, included the amount necessary to create a fully-funded, totally solvent pension account.

So instead of saying I'll pay you $25/hr. + pension, I'll say your contract calls for a $42/hr compensation, of which $25 goes to you, and $17 goes toward your pension costs. At least that way, everyone's being honest about the numbers.

http://abcnews.go.com/Business/city-...0#.T4BA2Kv2bd5

An analysis by Robert Novy-Marx of the University of Rochester and Joshua Rauh of the Kellogg School of Management finds that public pension plans for America's 50 biggest cities and counties are underfunded by $382 billion--or $14,000 for every household in those same cities. Some of the biggest plans may run out of money to pay promised benefits in as little as five to eight years.

[Scottathew]

So instead of saying I'll pay you $25/hr. + pension, I'll say your contract calls for a $42/hr compensation, of which $25 goes to you, and $17 goes toward your pension costs. At least that way, everyone's being honest about the numbers.

I agree with you there, but would add that if money is set aside for a pension, that the money should belong to the union, and the pension fund should be managed by the union and its members, and never ever by the employer. The liability of payouts would also belong solely to the union.

Of course, this fund would be invested just like a 401k. The only difference is that it would be managed in a more pooled fashion by the union. This way, if GM or the City of Detroit go bankrupt, it would have absolutely ZERO potential impact on retirees.

The only problem is the pensions, if not run properly, are ponzi-schemes. If you pay out too much from the fund, then your using the current workers wages to supplement the previous generation, and at some point the unsustainabity will cause it to collapse.

The best option is to have individual owned and managed 401Ks [[or other retirement tool). This way no one can steal\borrow\reallocate or over-subscribe payouts to people that aren't you.

[corktownyuppie]

I agree with you there, but would add that if money is set aside for a pension, that the money should belong to the union, and the pension fund should be managed by the union and its members, and never ever by the employer. The liability of payouts would also belong solely to the union.

I totally agree with this. In fact, I think it's criminal that corporations can use pension assets to pay operating costs.

The best option is to have individual owned and managed 401Ks [[or other retirement tool). This way no one can steal\borrow\reallocate or over-subscribe payouts to people that aren't you.

Yeah, I agree...the problem is that in my profession I deal with many people who -- to be blunt -- just don't have the individual capability to have this much responsibility. Yes, this goes against many of my free-market allegiances and desire for individual responsibility, etc. And I'm not talking about your average hard-working Joe that knows how to save but doesn't know a stock from a bond.

I'm talking about the people who live paycheck to paycheck, can't get control over spending, etc. etc. And while normally am in favor of people paying for the consequences of their poor decision making, the problem is that we ALL pay for the costs of their poor decision making.

So, yes, the societal benefit of pensions is enormous, not just to those receiving them, but also to those who have to live in proximity to those receiving them. But if there is a benefit to be given, the costs must also be made clear.

Otherwise you end up with plans where a pension payout is based on your last 3 years of employment...and those employees jack up as much overtime for 3 years so they can get paid on it for the next 20 years. I mean, that's great and all, but I'm sure if people were really made aware of how much those benefits cost, there's no way people would allow it to happen.