Why Not Privatize, if Public Pay’s Too High?
The arguments that Labor columnist Harry Bernstein presents against privatization are very weak and mainly emotional (“Privatization Can Hurt More Than Help, “ Aug. 6).
In his “typical” example, Bernstein states that when a private firm assumed the job of cleaning county hospitals, janitors’ wages dropped almost 50%.
To his credit, in the next paragraph he does admit that the lower wage level is average for all private-sector janitors. It doesn’t require an intellectual giant to put these two statements together and deduce that the county is a very generous employer.
Government employees that get hit with large pay cuts when their jobs are privatized will have a very difficult time adjusting. Despite this hardship, it is not unfair that they be paid the same as their counterparts in private industry.
What is unfair is to expect the increasingly burdened taxpayer to continue to pay for overpriced services.
JACK CRONE
Monterey Hills
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