Letter to the Editor of Waterbury Paper and My Reply

State worker will say no to concessions

       Last year, state employees held off on our two-year salary increases and gave up seven furlough days with the payment withdrawals during the week of the specified days. Now Gov. Dannel P. Malloy wants us to do the same thing again while enduring the same tax increases everyone else in the state is facing. It's like a double whammy on us state employees.

       What happened to all the managers, making big money, who where going to be eliminated? Could it be they helped Gov. Malloy get elected and he can't get rid of them? In the emissions division alone we have two managers making more than $100,000 a year when the job easily can be performed by one. Campaign promises already broken!

        My union had better not bend to the pressure this time in givebacks. I will vote no.

Walter Bertotti

Naugatuck



Who will support government workers when rich are gone?


       This is in response to Walter Bertotti's Feb. 20 letter, "State worker will say no to concessions."
       I agree with him that there can be deep cuts made to state spending, other than employee compensation, and there should be (but what do you expect with a liberal Democrat in the governor's mansion?).
       I also have to say, and it has been proved, that the average state worker gets a much better pay and benefits package than does a worker in the private sector in a comparable job.
       I run a small business in Connecticut, and I am getting sick and tired of the state taking my taxes and giving them to people who live off the state. I work hard for my money, and now the state wants to take more of it, while the spending goes on nonstop.
      The day of reckoning is here. There "ain't no more money."
      If raising taxes and increased government spending were the answer to our economic woes, the Connecticut economy would be booming. Instead, we have people and businesses leaving the state, businesses closing and the tax base dwindling.
      Keep it up! Tax the "rich," increase income taxes, increase the sales tax, increase regulations and mandates, and pretty soon the only people left in Connecticut will be state workers and people on welfare.
Who will pay the taxes to provide for those people then?
      We recently finished a census in this country. Did Mr. Bertotti bother to take a look at why the results were what they were? The states that lost population were union-only states, with liberal Democratic governments, high taxes, high government spending and strict regulations. The states that gained population were conservative Republican "right to work" states with low taxes, lower government spending and less regulation.
      Even Mr. Bertotti should be able to figure out why that is happening. The gravy train is over!

Jon Quint
Woodbury