Cost Cutting: There are currently about 36,000 state workers. The Minnesota public pension plans have over 294,000 active members. This past year, the state added another 450 workers. The average Full-Time-Equivalent (FTE) payroll for the state’s 33,514 workers in 1999 was $50,083. By 2009 the average FTE payroll was $72,668, an increase of over 45%. http://www.mmb.state.mn.us/doc/budget/report-fte/2009/fte-history.pdf
5) Are you prepared to support methods of reducing the overhead at the state level by eliminating services and the jobs related to these services? An effective cost-cutting approach entails the elimination of tens of thousands of state jobs. Are you prepared to lead that charge in an environment where the media and liberals in general are calling for the state to greatly expand its payroll?
| Benoit: Again, I say yes. The State of Minnesota is the largest employer in the state and now, getting bigger. There is nothing constitutional about the increase in the number of jobs and if anything I am for the state to begin the task of cutting jobs, the size of some of the departments and the state should be inviting many more private sector companies to become vendors in providing products and services to the state. The state should not be competing with the private sector in building roads, providing health care and a long list of other specific areas where a state vendor could do the work for much less than a state employee paying union dues. Again, we are at the point where we have to make these types of decisions and cut the spending across the board. We must somehow get the unionization of state workers to be illegal. There is no reason for government employees to unionize. This has rendered the government almost ineffective in providing service to the taxpayers and the people government claims they want to help. | Newman: Without equivocation, Yes and this question really gets to the heart of our spending problem. MN is the number one employer in this state involving thousands of government employees working for various agencies. As an attorney I have been involved in many cases of the government versus individuals and private businesses. I have been witness to the adverse effect of rules and regulation on our citizens and their ability to succeed in business. First we cut off the revenue because no bureaucracy can survive without taxpayer funding. I believe with the current budget problems, we have the best opportunity in a generation to do just that. Second, we systematically begin a program to repeal the thousands of pages of rules state agencies and departments thrive under. I have attached a budget handout to illustrate this problem. Note, in total dollars we spend more on welfare than we do on educating our kids. Built into that welfare budget are the salaries for the thousands social service employees throughout the state. Rhetorical question: Who’s on welfare? |
| Mahlstedt: YES, definitely YES. | Wilson: As the Mayor of Glencoe we have reduced staff to meet our declining revenues. We have also looked at ways to share services and equipment with other communities and the county. It is in our best interest to find reductions and economy in the services the state provides. I would be diligent in this pursuit. |
Addendum: Some confusion was presented to me that begs to be addressed. I stated that there were currently about 36,000 workers. The confusion comes from understanding how we are organized. The executive branch is 36,000. The notion of “Public Employees” engulfs local as well. From page 5 of the 2008 Workforce Report we can find this graph that explains this a bit better:
Total employment is really 389,700 in 2007. Sorry about the confusion… Admin
Tags: H Kimball, MN Senate 18, S Newman, Scott Newman