Posted by Raphael on Jun 4, 2009 in Rants | 0 comments

So Hawaii is certainly feeling some of the economy stuggles although from what I hear it’s still not as bad as it is in the Mainland.  Hotel occupany rates are hovering around 60% which hasn’t been seen in 30 years. Home sales aren’t plummeting as fast either but month after month we’re still seeing 5% – 10% slump in values and activity.

Construction is obviously down. I posted a few weeks back how one of the new condos was only halfway built? Well, nothing’s changed there.

Now the Governor has imposed a State-wide worker furlough to try recover some of the deficit we’ve built up lately. I have friends in State and City jobs…I hope they’ll do alright. Yet I can’t help but feel a little bit cynical about State and City jobs because I know the type of waste and inefficiency that occurs there.

Take this for example — every State worker is now supposed to take the equivalent of about 18% cut in pay as a result of taking 3 days off per month. You’d think, “oh, that really sucks but at least there’s a silver lining. They have 3 more days to spend with family PLUS they don’t lose their jobs”  Right?

Well, I heard it from a friend that some offices aren’t even going to take 3 days off. They’re making their workers come every day as usual but they can leave an hour earlier.  Whooodee-freakin’-do.  Yeah you want to see a demotivated state worker try to renew your business licenses on time?

You know what really burns my grill?  I heard on top of that they have to fill out a form in duplicate everyday, ASKING to leave the hour earlier. Is that full of shit or what?  So some geniouses in the State have decided that fixing the budget shortfall is accomplished by making workers spend 15minutes a day filling out forms printed out with my tax dollars.

Summamabillygoat.