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This is the second in a two-part series about what’s changed for public workers in Wisconsin, one year after labor protests gripped the state (part one is here).
Brian Austin is a Madison police detective. When he's not working, he's been active in protests against Gov. Scott Walker (Niala Boodhoo)
The Capitol building in Madison is amazing – anyone can just walk in. And in Madison, people often do just visit, like Brian Austin, who often brings his children here.
Austin is a detective with the City of Madison’s police department. He was also one of the tens of thousands who packed this building in protest when Gov. Walker proposed limiting union rights for public workers. The law – Act 10 – passed anyway. So Austin says when he goes into the building now, he can’t help think of it as a “completely different” building – and he means that in both a positive and a negative way.
His ambivalence is because he says Walker has brought the Wisconsin workers together – even though they’re suffering now.
The Wisconsin state worker’s union estimates that some 22,000 public employees are taking home 13 percent less pay since the law has taken effect. As it was written, public safety workers like police officers were supposed to be exempt.
But now, police and firefighters are finding, they, too, are facing increased pension and health care costs.
2. Public vs. private workers. A study that compares the compensation of public and private workers in Ohio says that the total compensation for public employees is worth 43 percent more than their private-worker counterparts. Amid the backdrop of controversial collective bargaining legislation known as SB5, the
recall Republican lawmakers who supported Gov. Scott Walker’s bid to restrict state workers’ collective bargaining rights.