Tuesday, April 5, 2011

God Damn the Republican Governor

Gutted like a catfish. God Damn the Republican Governor, House and Senate of Florida. In one selfish move they gutted the retirement plans of thousands of State workers. Thousands of workers have planned retirement strategies for decades that include a promised benefit called DROP (stands for Deferred Retirement Option Program). This program paid retirement benefits into an annuity of some kind while the worker finished the final five years of employment. And, it is fully funded in the FRS trust.The purpose was to keep senior and well experienced people around longer, and to give them a cash lump sum when they actually stopped working. This cash in most cases formed the heart of the person’s retirement plan.
The benefit is now gone as of July 1st. No matter that someone has planned for 30 years and is eligible one week or one day after that date. No matter. Sod off. Meanwhile the very rich legislators and governor suck the coffers dry with their very generous retirement benefits, health benefits and “all they can steal” benefits. Think I’m pissed?
Thank you Tea Party. You just broke a system that was the model for the country, was solvent and was working. Oh yeah, and the same gang also is requiring all state employees to contribute 3% of their gross salary to their retirement plans. No raises for the past 5 years and this amounts to a 3% pay cut. Three percent OFF THE TOP. GROSS. Imagine a 20k employee losing 3% of their wages off the top. What kind of sadistic moron would do that? Rich legislators and a rich governor, that's who.
I hope somebody sues the ass off all these greedy bastards for breach of contract or something. I’ll contribute to that fund.
Image: www.kathysgetaways.com

1 comment:

Jim said...

Did you catch the guv's photo op last week -- the one where he attended the Special Olympics and then announced he was drastically cutting funds for these unfortunate children? According to a report published in the April 5 Tallahassee Democrat, upon seeing a photographer, he callously snatched the Olympic torch from the hands of the bewildered youngster who was proudly carrying it and then waved it for the camera.