A collection of individuals standing as a larger more formidable group is certainly effective, (as demonstrated by the tea party folks) and there is nothing wrong with that.  Further, the intimidation factor is one of their tools, as it has always been.  And as a part of it, is the Alinsky rule that you must make it appear you have more power than you actually have.  So the bullying continues, recall petitions that have no chance are talked about planned, and will ultimately fail.

Fail.

I am going to do this once. I am going to offer a constructive suggestion to the public sector unions.  One that is already presented as the title of this article. I would suggest that Michigan's Public Sector Unions Should Support MIFTW (Michigan Freedom To Work)

Perhaps its a long shot to expect such support from the leadership, but membership in the public sector unions should note the tools for dealing with deficit spending in municipalities have been arriving via Lansing and our new legislature.  Those tools include the ability of managers to deal with contracts that are unmanageable for some governments given the realities of falling property values and the concurrent revenue shrinkage.

Even without those tools, layoffs still happened.

Public sector union members ought to consider their positions at risk in these tough environments as long as private sector employment continues to lag.  And as long as labor leadership attempts to deny Michigan a real job creating tool, the risk increases daily.

In a Detroit News editorial recently, a UAW member Terry Bowman makes a statement worth noting:

Union officials have a philosophy that says: "We want all the jobs, or none of the jobs." Business leaders are agreeing and saying: "OK, you get none of the jobs," and are taking their investment and jobs to right-to-work states. Michigan then loses out on the tax dollars needed to support public sector union employees.

If you are a public sector union employee, your best chance to retain and increase your benefits will only happen when the government has more tax dollars to pay you.

History proves that raising the tax rates for individuals and business only strangles investment. In Michigan, your employment stability will only strengthen when we adopt and pass a freedom-to-work bill.

Job creation in Michigan is the cure for shrinking government treasuries in Michigan.  Job growth in Right-to-Work states has outpaced Michigan's.  Boeing looked at Michigan BEFORE SC as an aside, and saw a forced unionism state. Competition says we must change fundamentally, the way in which we attract business. As for Michigan's job growth statistics, we are last, or near last still.

In many ways, I personally disagree with the idea of public sector unions (other than those voluntarily gathered) in Michigan.  However, I would acknowledge that an argument to remove such elements of our government operations would be hard to advance if the treasury is full.

And the treasuries in most municipalities are not now full.

Growth is necessary, and a return to low unemployment in the private sector is an absolute necessity in order to rebuild the financial stability that offers the best opportunity for healthy ongoing contracts between governments and their valuable employees.  The best opportunity to provide long term stability in some of the most sought after jobs that could possibly go away in absence of such growth.

Public sector employees should join in, calling for Freedom To Work in Michigan.