^ source?

11/10/2010 3:39:26 PM

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2010-11-10-1Afedpay10_ST_N.htm?csp=hf

Quote :

"The Defense Department had nine civilians earning $170,000 or more in 2005, 214 when Obama took office and 994 in June."

Why weren't Republicans crying about this during the boom days?

11/10/2010 6:39:51 PM

Quote :

"The number of federal workers earning $150,000 or more a year has soared tenfold in the past five years and doubled since President Obama took office, a USA TODAY analysis finds (see chart above). Federal workers earning $150,000 or more make up 3.9% of the workforce, up from 0.4% in 2005. The fast-growing pay of federal employees has captured the attention of fiscally conservative Republicans who won control of the U.S. House of Representatives in last week's elections. Already, some lawmakers are planning to use the lame-duck session that starts Monday to challenge the president's plan to give a 1.4% across-the-board pay raise to 2.1 million federal workers."

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2010-11-10-1Afedpay10_ST_N.htm

[Edited on November 11, 2010 at 12:27 AM. Reason : http://mjperry.blogspot.com/2010/11/highly-paid-federal-workers-increases.html]

11/11/2010 12:27:08 AM

Quote :

""The Defense Department had nine civilians earning $170,000 or more in 2005,"

For every DoD employee earning 170k+ there were probably a dozen or more defense contractors receiving such a salary. Remember kids, if you contract to the federal government your compensation is not set by the federal government.

11/11/2010 1:29:13 AM

http://gcn.com/articles/2010/11/10/union-head-disputes-federal-pay-claims.aspx

Quote :

""Among the 82,000 federal employees earning at least $150,000, more than half are doctors, lawyers, scientists, executives leading agencies or major programs, or people with specialized skills, such as nuclear scientists and air traffic controllers," she wrote. "Of the nearly 30 percent of that group who are doctors, the majority of them work at the Veterans Administration caring for wounded service members. By comparison, the Medical Group Management Association reports that median physician compensation in 2009 ranged from just under $200,000 for primary care physicians to $350,000 for specialty care physicians." More than two-thirds of the federal workforce earns less than $80,000 a year, she noted. "

There may be some workers in that group that shouldn't be earning that much, but there is also a portion of that group that should be earning more IMO. VA doctors treating our wounded Vets, still underpaid compared to their private peers. Anyone remember some of the big probes into the VA a few years ago, but underpaid doctors goes along with how Vets are generally not taken care of when they return home anyways. The growth in the field due to the ever increasing wounded from two wars, the same being true for defense contractors managing an ever increasing number of contracts etc etc etc.

Federal worker compensation is a pittance of the budget. Overpaid federal workers is a bogeyman invented by deficit hawks so that they can block worker pay raises and then have something to point at and say "see how fiscally conservative I am!!!" without having to face the real runaway parts of the federal budget like the military industrial complex or medicare.

11/12/2010 9:31:35 AM

Not that I don't agree that there are other places to worry about, but:

Quote :

"the real runaway parts of the federal budget like ... medicare"

Is caused in part by the belief that:

Quote :

"there is also a portion of that group that should be earning more IMO."

If part of the idea of these programs is keeping costs down, part of that should include deflating wages.

Also, assuming that if the amount that included doctors, lawyers etc was more then 66% or more than 75% that they would have said more than two thirds or three quarters respectively, even in a best case scenario, according to the union head, there's still 28,700 federal employees earning more than 150k per year that aren't doctors, lawyers, scientists, executives or people with specialized skills. That's still a goodly chunk of people. Even at the minimum of 150k, that's still $4,305,000,000 per year spent on those employees. I know that's "only" $4B, but a billion here and a billion there and pretty soon you're talking real money.

11/12/2010 11:59:15 PM

There's a lot of fixing that can be done if the government (federal, state, local, blah blah) would mimic their pension, 401k, and vacation compensation along the lines of fortune 500 companies.

I have no problem with people making over $150K a year while working for the government. I do care that when they retire, they could still be raking in $100K+ per year for the rest of their lives, that the number of people that receive this compensation continues to grow, and that the taxpayers are responsible for providing the funding. It's even more infuriating when a guy makes that type of money, but was absolutely incompetent at his job. At least when a company does it and they're forced to raise prices to compensate, I can choose to stop buying products from that company.

11/13/2010 11:24:39 AM

The problem with public sector bureaucracy is that literally everyone involved wants to expand and continue the bureaucracy. That's natural, it's their job, and people want to live better. However, in the public sector, wages are not restrained by market forces. In a private company, "make work" is the enemy. In a bureaucracy, "make work" keeps you in a job.

11/13/2010 11:36:59 AM

Quote :

"Is caused in part by the belief that: "

Aren't the funds that pay VA doctors separate from medicare? I think VA doctors should be paid more to reduce attrition and to get some of the best available doctors for our service people.




^^^I think I admitted that there might be some overpaid workers in the government. Just like there are some overpaid people in many companies. I'm honestly not against taking a close look at some of the salaries, but I personally think it should be done on an individual basis.

But what I think we have here is an attempt to demonize an entire sector of the population and with a huge brush called them all overpaid and underworked. It might be true for some but I don't think its true of the majority

11/13/2010 3:35:42 PM