Exactly. My standard retort is "So who or what is the Taxpayers' Union?" I mean, if we're going to talk collective bargaining, that should imply that both parties are bargaining collectively. That's the theory behind collective bargaining in the private sector, you have a large company with the collective capital of all the investors, etc, so the workers form a union to approach the negotiating table on more even terms.
Where is that in the public sector? Who is the "collective" representing the taxpayer? It's damn sure not the elected officials, who are in essence union representatives themselves. In the public sector, we effectively have a situation where the union is on both sides of the negotiating table.