Enemies of progress进步之敌
The biggest barrier to public- ctor reform are the unions公共部门改革的最大障碍是工会
IF JIMMY HOFFA were reincarnated as a modern trade unionist, he would probably reprent civil rvants. When Hoffa’s Teamsters were in their prime in 1960, only one in ten American government workers belonged to a union; now 36% do. In 2009 the number of unionists in America’s public ctor pasd that of their brethren in the private ctor. In continental Europe most civil rvants belong to unions, though the generally straddle the private ctor as well. In Britain more than half of public-ctor workers but only about 15% of private-ctor ones are unionid.吉米•霍法（注1）要是转世为现代工会一员，说不定会代表公务员。上世纪60年代，霍法领导的“国际卡车司机兄弟会”全盛之时，美国政府员工仅有十分之一是工会会员，而今却达36%。2009年，美国公共部门的工会会员数超过了私营部门的会员兄弟。而在欧洲大陆，尽管各工会普遍横跨公共与私营部门，但大多数公务员都是工会成员。在英国，超过一半公共部门员工加入了工会，私营部门员工这么做的，却仅
跨世代
有约15%。
There are three reasons for the public-ctor unions’ clout. First, they can shut things down without suffering much in the way of conquences. Second, they are mostly bright and well-educated. There are some Luddites（注2）穿岩 left, such as Bob Crow （注3）of London’s perennially striking Tube drivers. But it is much harder to argue with Randi Weingarten, the articulate head of the American Federation of Teachers. Most workers in the public ctor are women, and many of them are professional types. A quarter of America’s public-ctor workers have a university degree. Officers of the British Medical Association (which reprents doctors) and America’s National Education Association (the biggest teachers’ union) often appear on the news as experts on health and education rather than as reprentatives of interest groups.
牛肉米粉公共部门工会举足轻重的原因有三。其一，他们可以罢工闹事，却无需承担太多后果。其二，成员大多头脑灵活，受过良好教育。有些人是勒德派遗留分子，如带领伦敦地铁司机长期罢工的鲍勃•克罗，比较好应付。但要跟兰迪•温加藤争论就费劲多了，她可是美国教
师联合会的头头，口齿伶俐。公共部门员工女性居多，不少是专业人士。美国公共部门员工有四分之一具备大学学历。而代表医生权益的英国医学会和最大的教师工会——美国国家教育协会，其官员在新闻中露面时，身份通常是医疗及教育专家，而非利益团体代表。
Third, they now dominate left-of-centre politics. Some of their ties go back a long way. Britain’s Labour Party, as its name implies, has long been associated with trade unionism. Its current leader, Ed Miliband, owes his position to votes from public-ctor unions. Spain’s prime minister still likes to brandish his union card. In America the links have become more explicit. Between 1989 and 2004 the biggest spender in federal elections was the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, and $39.4m of the $40m it shelled out over that period went to Democrats. One in ten of the delegates at the 2008 Democratic National Convention in Denver was a teacher.其三，这些人目前主导着中左政治。其间有些关系追溯起来，渊源颇深。英国工党，顾名思义，与工会主义的联系源远流长。工党现任领袖埃德•米利班德能有此地位，公共部门工会的选票功不可没。西班牙首相仍爱炫耀他的工会会员证。在美国，政党与工会之间联系更明显。1989~2004
年联邦大选中，“美国州、郡、市联合工会”挥霍最多，当时花了4000万美元，其中有3940万美元流向了民主党。而2008年在丹佛召开的民主党全国代表大会，十分之一的代表都是教师。
鲁滨逊漂流记读后感50
At the state level their influence can be even more fearsome. Mark Baldassare of the Public Policy Institute of California points out that much of the state’s budget is patrolled by unions. The teachers’ unions keep an eye on schools, the CCPOA on prisons and a variety of labour groups on health care. It was the big public-ctor unions which squashed the 2005 reforms propod by Arnold Schwarzenegger, then California’s governor.在州一级，公共部门工会的影响力甚至更恐怖。加利福尼亚公共政策研究所的马克•巴尔达萨雷指出，加州多数预算都被工会巡查。教师工会盯着学校，加州监狱和平促进委员会（CCPOA）看着监狱，而各种各样的劳工团体则监视着医疗保健。2005年，正是这些公共部门的大工会，让加州州长阿诺德•斯瓦辛格的改革提案灰飞烟灭。
In many rich countries average wages in the state ctor are higher than in the private one. But the real gains come in benefits and work practices. Politicians have repeatedly “
backloaded” public-ctor pay deals, keeping the pay increas modest but adding to holidays and especially pensions that are already generous.许多富国，公共部门的平均收入要高于私营部门。但真正的收益出自福利与工作事务。政客们再三“支持提高”卖油翁翻译公共部门的工资协议待遇，其工资持续增长，增幅虽不大，但公休也不断增加，尤其本就丰厚的养老金也一个劲上涨。
Many Germans were horrified to discover that the EU rescuepackage for Greece last year helped to bail out public-ctor workers who could retire in their mid-50s on almost full pay. One scam in American cities has been to link pensions to employees’ earnings in their final year, rather than average earnings over a longer period. Naturally the subway drivers or policemen concerned put in heroic overtime in that final year.去年，欧盟针对希腊实施了一揽子救援计划，帮该国公共部门的员工脱了困，让他们在55岁左右退休时，能拿到几乎全额的退休金，很多德国人发现这事后，大为震惊。而美国各市耍了个花招，将退休金与雇员工作生涯最后一年的收入挂钩，而非与更长一段时间的平均收入结合。自然，地铁司机或警察就会在最后一年里，争做英雄，天天加班了。
Reform has been vigorously oppod, perhaps most egregiously in education, where charter schools, vouchers, academies and merit pay all faced drawn-out battles. Even though there is plenty of evidence that the quality of the teachers is the most important variable, teachers’ unions have fought against getting rid of bad ones and promoting good ones.改革一直遭到强烈反对，可情势最糟的，或许是教育战线，其中，特许学校、夜宿山寺古诗教育券、私立中学跟教师绩效工资都面临多场持久战。即便众多证据都表明，教师素质才是影响教育水平的最重要变量，但教师工会还是反对开除业绩差的老师，提拔奖赏业绩好的老师。
As the cost to everyone el (in terms of higher taxes and sloppier rvices) has become clearer, politicians have begun to clamp down. In Wisconsin the unions have rallied thousands of supporters against Scott Walker, the hardline Republican governor. But many within the public ctor suffer under the current system too.由于税收增加，公共服务越发马虎，公共部门工会之外的人生活成本日益明显，政客已开始施压。在威斯康辛州，工会召集了成千上万的支持者，反对强硬的共和党州长斯科特•沃克。但现行体制下，
公共部门许多人日子也不好受。
John Donahue at Harvard’s Kennedy School points out that the egalitarian culture in Western civil rvices suits tho who want to stay put but is bad for high achievers. Heads of departments often get only two or three times the average pay. As Mr Donahue obrves, the only American public-ctor workers who earn well above $250,000 a year are university sports coaches and the president of the United States. Hank Paulson took a 99.5% pay cut when he left Goldman Sachs to become America’s treasury cretary. Bankers’ fat pay packets have attracted much criticism, but a public-ctor system that does not reward high achievers may be a much bigger problem for America.哈佛大学肯尼迪学院的约翰•唐纳修指出，西方公共部门奉行的平等主义文化，适合那些希望稳定的人，但对成功人士却不利。政府各部门头头的收入，通常只有平均水平的两至三倍。就像唐纳修先生注意到的，美国公共部门年收入丰厚到超过强进25万美元的员工，只有大学体育教练和美国总统。汉克玩跷跷板•鲍尔森离开高盛集团成为美国财政部长时，收入就少了99.5%。银行家薪水高一直饱受指摘，但公共部门薪酬体系没有成就激励，或许才是美国面临的最大问题。
