The IRS paid union officials for 521,725 hours though they were working for the IRS union the entire time. That’s the equivalent of over 260 full-time employees, yet the IRS claimed that only 201 employees were paid by the IRS. If the IRS claim is true, then these union officials likely received overtime for “working” on union projects and likely received paid vacations while exclusively working on union projects not their official federal government duties.
This taxpayer-funded union activity goes by the misnomer: “official time” so as to imply an official purpose, yet officially there is no federal government purpose for the activity. Taxpayers are funding private employees and officers of labor unions who are doing no work for the taxpayers’ money.
The fact is that there are numerous federal employees, who are also union officials, work ZERO hours for the federal government, yet are paid full-time, given bonuses, raises, paid vacations, and promotions. But, this can’t be so according to the IRS union’s top boss.
The IRS union’s National President Colleen M. Kelley claims that “By statute, official time cannot be used for any purpose not directly related to the representation of bargaining unit employees in matters concerning conditions of employment, such as bargaining contracts or agreements. Official time cannot be used for internal union activities or for any political purpose. ”
It is unrealistic to believe that these union officials who work full-time for the union are meeting the statute guidelines as describe by Kelley above.
Even if we suspend reality and assume that these taxpayer-funded union officials are not working on politics, that still means that taxpayers are freeing-up $23.5 million that the union would have spent paying its union officials. The union could have used all that $23.5 million of savings on politics, and they likely do use much of it for politics.
It also may not surprise you to know that the IRS union is the most partisan of all unions with almost 100% of its political expenditures going to Democrats.
And, it is worth noting that during Obama’s re-election year IRS union officials gouged taxpayers for an additional 52,000 taxpayer-paid hours over the non-federal election year 2013 (573,319 hours in 2012 over 521,725 hours in 2013).
No getting around it, Taxpayers are funding Big Labor’s political operations and it happens in just about every state as well. SEIU is even subsidized right here in Fairfax County, Virginia.
From the Washington Examiner:
*note: Colleen M. Kelley’s quote also came from the Washington Examiner article cited above.The Treasury Department has revealed to the House Ways and Means Committee that Internal Revenue Service employees spent over 500,000 hours on union activities last year. They estimated the cost to taxpayers at $23.5 million in salary and benefits.
Officials told Secrets that the exact hours IRS members of the National Treasury Employees Union dedicated to labor activities was 521,725 in fiscal 2013, which ran from October 2012 to September 2013. That was slightly less than the 573,319 hours in fiscal 2012, according to the IRS, but the spending was significantly above that year’s total of $16 million.
The agency came under fire last year when it was revealed that they had 201 workers, some earning $100,000 a year or more, dedicated to union activities.
California’s Big Labor-concocted A.B.5, signed into law by Gov. Gavin Newsom in 2019, made it almost impossible for workers and firms to bounce back after 2020’s COVID-19 lockdowns. Now Biden bureaucrats want to federalize A.B.5!
Mr. Fain undoubtedly knows full well that there is a complete disconnect between the UAW hierarchy and the UAW rank-and-file on the Biden presidency and whether workers will benefit from its extension for another four years.
On average, forced-unionism states are 23.2% more expensive to live in than Right to Work states. And decades of academic research show that compulsory unionism actually fosters a higher cost of living.