Alright I’m giving up on getting anything of substance done tonight on my math research so it’s time to watch the election results (the official state page is here but nbc and abc seem to be about 100 precincts ahead but I couldn’t find an abc summar page). So far the results are looking pretty good from my perspective. Prop 75 (the union contribution one) looks to be passing and everything else is failing. Though the numbers on the abortion proposition are stil worrying and I also find it sorta disappointing that redistricting didn’t pass though I suppose that it’s failure is a strategic advantage for the dems on a national level.

UPDATE: Looks like both the abortion and the union contribution propositions (73, 75) are both going down. Overall this special election could have turned out awful but ultimately turned out totally neutral with absolutely nothing passing. What a waste of money!

Anyway if you want a graphical look at the cultural divide in california take a look at this map of the results of prop 73 (the abortion one).

I’m still not sure what to think of the teacher’s tenure initiative. It isn’t like high school teachers need tenure for research integrity so I’m not really sure why they have it in the first place. On the other hand what is effective in atracting good teachers and driving off bad ones is going to depend on alot of complex statistics. Unfortunately this is exactly the sort of question government seems utterly incapable of dealing with. The issue is too complicated and technical for the voters to deal with it (I don’t have the time to read through piles of economic analysis about teacher pay. Do you?) and concentrated interests on one side make it impossible to deal with in the legislature. Not that teachers are somehow ‘evil’ but they naturally lobby for their interests (greater pay, more benefits) while it is in the governments best interest to get the most work for the least pay out of teachers. Since teachers are excited by the issue and no one is excited by the complex economic analysis all the legislators have a strong incentive to listen to the teachers.

There needs to be some solution to deal with these sort of issues. We need some kind of oversight by reputable independent analysis groups. I do not, however, have any idea of how to bring it about. In particular I don’t know what can be done to draw enough attention to reputable analysis groups so that the average person doesn’t just get confused by industry or party created ‘foundations’ at election time.

Admitedly I find the self-righteous position taken by the teachers and firefighters in this election really annoying. As if deciding to take a job teaching kids or fighting fires makes one a morally superior person. However, if your going to take this morally superior position you shouldn’t engage in blatantly misleading political manipulation. I guess it is just how politics works but it particularly rankles me after seeing those commercials talking about teachers and firefighters as if they were saints.

Anyway getting to the misinformation all these commercials claim that teachers and firefighters already have the right to stop their money from going to causes they don’t support. In some sense this is technically true, they can’t force individuals in a government job to contribute money to causes they don’t support. However, what they can do is require anyone not wanting to contribute to political causes to drop their union membership and lose any input on collective barganing deciscions plus fill out forms demanding the political portion of their union contributions back (non-members are still required to contribute to the union). It is my understanding that this is what most of the unions in questions do and is probably what is funding these misleading ads in the first place.

Proposition 75 in the upcoming Californian special election would ban the use of public employee union money in political campaigns without the prior written consent of the union member each year. Of course the motivation for this proposition is probably to cut off a source of democratic funds. Still just because the motivation is political does not mean that the proposition does not deserve to be considered on the merits.

I think it is pretty clear that in an ideal world such unauthorized political contributions would be illegal. In fact I’ve yet to hear a single person argue that it is just and fair for unions to lobby with workers money without their consent. The primary argument given against the proposition is that it is unfair to restrict union money in such a manner without similarly restricting corporate money. However, while corporate money may fill the analogous political role they are far from equivalent. Besides the analogy is already flawed since private unions remain unaffected.

Unlike the situation with unions an individual investing in stock usually does have the real option of choosing another stock. For exactly the same reasons that liberals argue for legal protections in the workplace instead of letting the market take care of the situation union donations are coercive in ways that corporate donations are not. In my relatively short employment career I have been in three jobs with union representation. In two union membership complete with fees docked from my paycheck was mandatory and in the third it was my only choice for group representation. Admittedly public employees cannot be legally forced to join these unions (though they may still have to pay fees as do GSIs to the union for bargaining and representation services) but in practice I expect firemen, teachers and prison wardens are effectively forced into membership.

Still in some situations employers give employees stock as a form of compensation and these individuals are just as coerced into making political contributions contrary to their interests as are union members. Also I do not know if there is any kind of reporting requirement giving stock holders information about what the company they own is lobbying for and against. While I do think that these things ought to be required I don’t know if they count as significant enough or coercive enough to justify a vote against the measure.

Ultimately I think if this was just a democrat vs. republican issue I would let my Machiavellian impulses add to the above two concerns and incline me towards no. However, it occurs to me that the California Prison Guards’ Union would be covered by such a law and they are an evil far worse than mere conservatives. I think this consideration will incline me to vote yes. Besides, I think the Democrats could do with less control by the classical forces of big labour.