Governor Daniels Asks Indiana State Workers to Sacrifice

[IndianaGreen]

Governor Daniels Asks Indiana State Workers to Sacrifice

Continuing the trend of trying to offset the cost of today's economic crisis on the backs of working people. As reported in the Indianapolis Star, Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels has asked police officers, firefighters, teachers and other public employees to make a personal sacrifice: voluntarily forgo their pay increases for 2009.

Given the disproportionate distribution of wealth in this country, there is no reason to ask working people to sacrifice until there have been significant efforts at a redistribution of wealth, particularly targeting the wealthiest 1% of the nation. The request came in the wake of the governor's decision earlier this month to freeze the wages of state workers, including his own, in hopes of reducing a projected $763 million state budget spending gap through June.

State workers are struggling already. The Federal Poverty Threshold is $21,200 for a family of four in Indiana. The median family income in Indiana of $47,422 is defined as "low-income" because it is just over 200% of the of the poverty threshold. Many state employees earn significantly less than that. In fact, poverty is widespread in Indiana.

As reported by Suite101.com:

The major cities that have reached critical poverty levels (50% above the state average) are the following:

* Bloomington (29.6%)
* East Chicago (24.4%)
* Gary (25.8%)
* Marion (16.9%)
* Muncie (23.1%)
* South Bend (16.7%)
* Terre Haute (19.2%)
* West Lafayette (38.3%)

In a State administration where a Clerical Assistant 4 grosses $24,437 after many years of working at the State, asking State employees to forego their raises is wrong. In a state with rampant poverty, it is not helpful to resolving the economic crisis to deny State workers raises.

http://indianacp.blogspot.com/

[LiberalFighter]

1. Despite the claim that Indiana has low taxes.