Statistics can be misleading

Re: “It’s time to re-evaluate arbitration,” Ideas, Derek Fildebrandt, June 11 I won’t dwell on the comparison of AUPE members’ collective bargaining efforts to greedy, spoiled children demanding an allowance increase. I trust readers to recognize such mean-spirited hyperbole for what it is.

What I will take issue with — again — is Derek Fildebrandt’s insistence on regurgitating inaccurate and misleading statistics about the pay levels of front-line government employees.

He trots out the completely deceptive figure that the average government employee costs $102,000 a year in salary and benefits — but this average includes more than 7,000 managers and nonunion employees. The government’s own data shows the average AUPE member employed by the Alberta government earns less than $65,000 a year.

Fildebrandt also fails to mention those 22,000 front-line workers account for only half of the government’s total payroll costs. The other half goes to the 7,300 managers and nonunion employees.

There are 3,100 names on the province’s “sunshine list” of employees earning a base salary exceeding $100,000. Of those, only 88 are AUPE members (mostly in jobs requiring professional degrees or specialized scientific expertise). Fildebrandt should know this. After all, he lobbied long and hard for that list. Guy Smith , presid ent , Alberta Union of Provincial Employees