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Trading Five for Three...A Good Deal?
Woven throughout an article on the flap over changing retirement benefits for state workers, there’s the story of Teddy Cramer:
Teddy Cramer’s quandary was common among state workers. After nearly 30 years working for the State of Utah Cramer had second thoughts about retiring Dec. 15 to preserve her medical benefits.
…
Four weeks ago, Cramer decided to save herself another month of emotional turmoil and retired without waiting for the justices to rule. Her last day on the job was “horrible. I kept going back and forth, back and forth,” Cramer said. “When I left work that day, I honestly didn’t know what I was going to do.”
…
Cramer, 55, says if she hadn’t been afraid of losing more than three years of medical coverage, she would have worked for the state another five years. She says the change in the sick leave policy is just the first incremental cut in state employees’ benefits. “I wanted to get out while the getting was good,” Cramer said.From Salt Lake Tribune - Utah
Referenced Tue Jan 10 2006 07:10:29 GMT-0700 (MST)
Something’s not right with this logic. The paper must have gotten it wrong. Cramer obviously didn’t want to retire based on her comments about “going back and forth.” Even so she traded five years of work and five years of medical benefits for three years of medical benefits and a part time job. That doesn’t make sense to me. Can someone explain this?
Posted by windley on January 10, 2006 07:08 AM
Comments
The one-time pay out of unused sick leave and taking early retirement must be a better economic proposition for the workers than sticking it out under the new system. No doubt the workers mentioned in the article really do want to keep their jobs (and that is not a snide remark intended to disparage them; there are many dedicated, well-intentioned folks working for the state.)
Posted by: skippy at January 10, 2006 11:03 AM
If you assume people make economic choices rationally, then that's certainly true, but what I'm trying to understand is why is that so?
As an aside, I find it fascinating that we can't mention public employees without also making sure we also mention how dedicated and well-intentioned they are. That's particularly true if you're a legislator or the governor.
Posted by: Phil at January 10, 2006 11:09 AM
Well that is because public employees often get a bad rap, especially here in Utah. Yes there are slackers and folks who do crappy jobs. I, for one, would like to see more data on job performance, pay, etc. etc. I could easily condemn a whole group of people based upon my annecdotal evidence. For example, I could easily conclude that a particular business (name your most unfavortie one) is a horrible company because I had a couple of bad interactions with their customer service agents or observed some shoddy workmanship on occasion. Many people seem to do the same thing with state employees, or just take the word of others and their annecdotal evidence.
The reason I made the remark above is because it would be easy to twist my words to mean "oh they just want to keep their easy state job." That is not what I intended by that remark. Now I have no specific knowledge as to why a politician would defend a state worker other than the fact that they know many personally and when you know folks it gets harder and harder to (sorry to throw in such a terrible metaphor) paint them with a broad brush.
Posted by: skippy at January 10, 2006 11:28 AM
And I agree with you, I would like to see the math or at least have it described a little more fully. The article is sorely wanting in that regard.
Great blog, by the way. I've been lurking around it for some time and finally made a comment.
Posted by: skippy at January 10, 2006 11:40 AM