Memphis Cops Call in Sick in New Tactic to Stop Cuts
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Police and firefighters in Memphis are calling in sick by the scores as a new Tennessee law kicks in requiring cities to stop shortchanging workers’ pensions.
Their beef: Memphis’s plan to comply. Tennessee’s largest city, which for years has failed to save enough to support promised retirement checks, plans to make up that sum by eliminating retirees’ health insurance, which has fewer legal protections. At one point, 558 police officers stayed home, one fourth of the force, in a city that had the sixth-highest incidence of violent crime in the U.S. last year. At the end of last week, 131 were out.