Bill Daley acknowledges depth of union politics

by Paul Kersey Possible gubernatorial candidate Bill Daley said something interesting at his “pension plan” news conference Monday morning. It just wasn’t really what he wanted to emphasize. Though he summoned the media for the occasion, the former White House Chief of Staff had little to say about why pensions in Illinois are in the...

by Paul Kersey

Possible gubernatorial candidate Bill Daley said something interesting at his “pension plan” news conference Monday morning.

It just wasn’t really what he wanted to emphasize.

Though he summoned the media for the occasion, the former White House Chief of Staff had little to say about why pensions in Illinois are in the shape that they are in, or how he would go about fixing them, aside from voicing support for legislation crafted by House Speaker Mike Madigan. Instead, he spent the majority of the press conference blaming Gov. Pat Quinn for his mishandling of the politics surrounding pensions.

Despite his focus on the politics – and not a policy that will fix pensions – Daley did manage to make one interesting point. As mentioned above, Daley threw his support behind the Madigan bill, though it is opposed by government worker unions. Daley is also seeking the government worker union nomination. Asked by a reporter how he would win union support after crossing them on such an important issue, Daley riffed about different unions and workers with different agendas, then observed that:

“Yes, I know this is difficult for labor organizations that represent state employees and government employees. I get that. They’re as political – and I say that in a positive way – as elected officials because they have to run for office.”

By “run for office,” Daley is probably referring to elections for union offices, which are only one small way in which government unions are political creatures. But wittingly or not, Daley highlights an important truth about government worker unions; one with major consequences for the pension debate and Illinois politics in general.

Government worker unions are not politically neutral representatives of government workers’ economic interests. If they were, their leaders would understand the gravity of $96 billion in unfunded pension liabilities, as well as the fundamentally unstable nature of defined benefit pensions. They would drive a hard bargain, to be sure, but we would be able to deal with them on the economic merits and develop a plan that the state can afford over the long haul.

Instead, government unions are extremely partisan and ideological, and their agenda goes well beyond just making sure that government workers get a fair shake. These same government worker unions occupy a powerful position in state politics, with special legal authority written into state law and a large campaign war chest that is effectively underwritten by taxpayers.

Bill Daley recognizes the political nature of government unions. But to him, this is somehow a “positive,” even as he stakes a position on pensions that puts him in opposition to those same unions. This is something he is going to need to think through more thoroughly if he is to do any better than Quinn has.