The real ‘two Americas’: government and the governed
The public sector sees a totally different America than the rest of us do.
That’s true in the broadest sense: Two-thirds of the political class believe the country is moving in the right direction, while 84 percent of other Americans think we’re headed the wrong way, according to a Rasmussen Reports opinion poll earlier this month.
But the divide between government and the governed goes deeper than these momentary feelings. It shows up in our paychecks as well.
Last week USA Today reported that the average federal civilian employee earns twice as much in salary and benefits as the average private-sector worker. These federal workers are paid 61 percent more than the rest of us and receive almost four times as much in retirement and other benefits.
President Barack Obama has proposed an across-the-board pay raise of 1.4 percent next year for these 2 million workers, at a cost of $2.2 billion. The USA Today story noted that this would be the smallest federal pay hike in a decade.
To those whose pay has been frozen for a while now, a raise of “only” 1.4 percent doesn’t sound like much of a sacrifice.
But hey, don’t blame the feds for feeling like they’re getting shortchanged this year: Even adjusted for inflation, their pay has climbed almost 37 percent since 2000, or four times faster than wages for the rest of us.
Despite Obama’s new, ahem, restraint on salaries, it doesn’t look as if this gap will get narrower anytime soon.
On Thursday, I searched the federal government’s employment website, USAJobs.gov, for openings in metro Atlanta.
A search for jobs in my ZIP code turned up 169 listings from the North Carolina border to the Florida line, even though the search was supposed to be within a 20-mile radius (that’s close enough for government work, I guess).
A dozen jobs listed no salary figure. Of the other 157, a staggering 110 were for more than the average wage in their county, according to the latest federal data. Add the greater value of public benefits, and 144 of the 157 were above average.
And these are just minimums — each of the 157 listings had a pay scale based on factors like experience, and I’ve cited the bottom of these ranges. But for 92 of the jobs, the scale topped out above $100,000.
Some openings were for jobs like epidemiologists at the Centers for Disease Control, which you’d expect to pay better than the average job in DeKalb County. But there were also jobs like the one paying up to $85,000 a year for a maintenance mechanic supervisor in Calhoun, where the average annual wage is less than $35,000.
No wonder the political/bureaucratic class thinks we have it so good.
And no wonder the political/bureaucratic class thinks the answer to problems ranging from health care to Wall Street is to hire more bureaucrats and give more power to politicians. From their vantage point, the world works pretty well.
But when you’re one of the millions of Americans who earns half as much as a federal bureaucrat simply because your employer has to answer to market conditions and his doesn’t, things aren’t so rosy.
Ditto if you’re one of the millions more who pays for his salary regardless of whether he provides you with a service — much less whether you think that service is valuable.
The political class likes to talk about whether we can countenance a new age of austerity. What its members don’t realize is that, for many of the rest of us, it’s already here.
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290 comments Add your comment
Grand Forks
August 14th, 2010
9:14 pm
“and racist fools like Grand forks who thinks that a Harvard educated lawyer who taught Constitutional law at the University of Chicago for eight years is “an idiotic, retarded, child-like, stupid, in-over-his-head, troglodyte” and that he is a “Muslim” I realize what how a reformed alcoholic and drug addict in Glen Beck with no degree of any kind, no college credits, no journalistic training, no knowledge, and a probable bipolar personality is taken seriously.”
Suck it, ma’am.
Grand Forks
August 14th, 2010
9:15 pm
“who thinks that a Harvard educated lawyer who taught Constitutional law at the University of Chicago for eight years”
Affirmative action.
khc
August 14th, 2010
9:19 pm
another pity comment..not
khc
August 14th, 2010
9:20 pm
oops typo should be pithy
Conservatism needs some intellect
August 14th, 2010
9:23 pm
JD,
Excellent comments and I saw virtually nothing else worth reading here (including the original article) besides what you wrote.
Linda,
Who made this a “conservative” blog? I thought it was a public place where people can post what they choose. I made the mistake I guess of thinking that I was living in a free, open and democratic society in which one could express dissenting or different views. But I do agree that conservatives posting in a “conservative blog” cannot be “swayed” by argument or evidence and often don’t even have a concept of the evidence such as your unintelligible remarks about global warming show.
As I said earlier, I seldom watch MSNBC, I read the print media, left and right. It is mostly conservatives who have created this alienating, adversarial mode of political discourse, and who seek out echo chambers such as talk radio and Fox television where they can just hear their views repeated back to them. Virtually every time a conservative responds to me here they just provide more evidence for the claims I make about their dogmatism and refusal to engage evidence.
The first indications of global warming appeared in work as early as the 60s and received increasing attention from scientists worldwide by the 1990s. By the way “climate change” is Frank Luntz’s (used the wrong name in an earlier post) substitute for “global warming” meant as a euphemism to downplay its significance. The phrase does not actually designate a new phenomenon as you seem to think. (Luntz is the same man who gave us the phrases “death tax” for “estate tax” and “tax burden” and “tax relief” and most recently “government takeover of health care.”) You can dismiss global warming through some unclear (which is what I meant by I don’t understand what you are trying to say earlier) gestures at “common sense” and the “third grade” and a misunderstanding of changes in the terminology but it is a matter of scientific investigation. Why does the National Academy of Sciences, arguably the most prestigious science organization in the United States hold the view that global warming is a real phenomenon and has issued annual reports on it for almost ten years? Do elite scientists have no “common sense?” Did the International Panel on Climate Change comprised of 2000 scientists from around the globe systematically misread the literature and lack common sense or did they look at all the data and arrive at well founded scientific conclusion? I don’t know where you obtained a degree in science but your comments show a breath taking ignorance and irrationality.
If you have “…never seen the American people so awake & angry, protesting in the streets!” you must not remember the 1960s in which many thousands more of a much smaller population took to the streets for civil rights and in opposition to an unjust war. All I see now is a mob of angry, empty headed conservatives who think Obama is a Muslim who wasn’t born in the U.S., that the government “wants to kill your grandmother” and so on. And if you think that distrust of government originated with Obama you must not remember Watergate and the resignations of both a vice president and then a president. You must not remember before that LBJ saying that he “would not send American boys to do what Asian boys should be doing” before he escalated the troop levels in Vietnam to 500,000. And you most have short memory indeed if you don’t recall the lies and manipulation of the American public by “W” who told us that “Iraq harbored terrorists including al Qaeda” and Saddam was an imminent threat with chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons which he didn’t have. You “memory” is determined by your conservatism I would suggest but it certainly isn’t grounded in history.
Well, I have seen enough here. I won’t be back to renew my sense of horror at what passes for “thought” among ordinary conservatives and journalism by a little boy “journalist” with a bee in his bonnet about the big, bad, federal government.
Grand Forks
August 14th, 2010
9:30 pm
“The first indications of global warming appeared in work as early as the 60s and received increasing attention from scientists worldwide by the 1990s.”
WRONG! In the 1907’s, TIME magazine “warned” of the new ice age. You left wing retards are nothing but fear mongering half-wits who spend 90% of your time railing on FOX News.
Bottom line: Get a life, ma’am.
Grand Forks
August 14th, 2010
9:31 pm
“Did the International Panel on Climate Change comprised of 2000 scientists from around the globe systematically misread the literature and lack common sense or did they look at all the data and arrive at well founded scientific conclusion?”
No, they were bought off by Al Gore and the left wing communists.
No one cares about global warming because people realize that it was nothing but a scam.
Grand Forks
August 14th, 2010
9:31 pm
“In the 1907’s”
1970’s, not 1907s.
Linda
August 14th, 2010
9:34 pm
John @ 8:10, Really?
Quite frankly, I think the global warming alarmists could have come up with a better culprit than our breath, such as things that actually get hot.
Where are these scientific specialists in these appropriate fields? At East Anglia, Professor Mann, the UN, etc. who have all been discredited?
I don’t think my fifth grade teacher was obnoxious or foolish. She was right then & would still be right today.
The problem of addressing scientific issues with scientific evidence is that it makes no common sense. Why did Obama when he was on the Joyce Foundation direct over a million dollars to the Chicago Climate Exchange? What was the connection between the Chicago Climate Exchange, Al Gore & Goldman Sacs? Why did the Federal National Mortgage Assn., responsible for the world-wide economic recession, obtain 2 patents for climate change gimmicks, while under the direction of Franklin Raines who was fired after earning $91 M while cooking the books? Would you like more questions that pertain to real scientific evidence?
jt
August 14th, 2010
9:59 pm
I would bet a dollar to a don-nut that “Conservatism needs some intellect ” got duped on the “swine flu” scare too. Probably bought into that “silent spring” thing also. What does algore say about suckers? Or was that PT Barnem? Can’t remember.
We know he got duped on voting for Obama.
It burns the lefties bad.
Real bad.
khc
August 14th, 2010
10:01 pm
linda, fannie alone did not create the recession….it is just bs talking points…and makes you look stupid
Grand Forks
August 14th, 2010
10:03 pm
“and makes you look stupid”
Hey kfc, it’s gotta suck to be you. I know your messiah is really tanking and it must really piss you off. Oh well, you still have Oprah to cry to, ma’am.
khc
August 14th, 2010
10:07 pm
real cute fork you …..conservatism needs intellec kicked your arse
Linda
August 14th, 2010
10:17 pm
jd @8:39, Back to what I said @ 7:48, we can no longer afford the fed. govt. or the states who have also been reckless. Companies cannot afford the unions. My question, again, is what’s your solution?
The fed. govt.’s solution is to monetize the debt which the Fed. Reserve swore in Congress 6 mts. ago they would not do, for obvious reasons. They are doing it. It will cause rampant inflation. It will be the end of our country. What is your answer?
My mind is not closed to discussion. I welcome discussion from you or anyone else who is open to fair debate. I warned Conservatism at least twice today that no one reads long blogs & he keeps writing long blogs, as if anyone would take the time to read them. He needs to go back to the bathroom mirror & preen.
Do you work for the govt.?
I only asked Conservatism to stop using this blog to preen in front of the mirror.
Linda
August 14th, 2010
10:48 pm
Conservatism @ 9:23, Kyle is a conservative & this a conservative blog but you can express any rhetoric you choose.
Global warming did not appear in the 1960’s. Global cooling appeared in the 1970’s.
I read your entire ranting post & this is all I could come up with.
May God bless you.
Not So Casual Observer
August 14th, 2010
10:53 pm
Conservatism needs…
As most libs, you are full of BS and hot air – perhaps the real cause of the fraudulent “global warming” is your inflated sense of self-worth.
You have proved nothing regarding the college life of the Imposter in Chief, you simply regurgitate the Lib talking points. Interesting that BO chose a Democrat stronghold state to assist in his scam.
I will accept your claim to be a professor (ethics?- no), nothing could be more appropriate. Those who can – DO, those who can’t -TEACH. You write as I am sure you lecture, by bloviating on anything and everything expecting to overcome your intellectual and academic failings with volume.
You are the typical Lib, never prove anything and simply dismiss as unreasonable an opposing position. There has been nothing proven about Obama’s academic record nor his place of birth. As before, produce the actual BIRTH CERTIFICATE or be quiet!
If you desire to live in a nation of socialists there are several who will take you, I and 60+% of the American people do not. As your loathsome leader Nancy Pelosi said, “Elections have consequences”, so learn to live with the next 2 national elections. Fortunately for you, Conservatives do not believe in political prisons.
Are you the professor who invited God to smite him from his stool to prove He existed? I would like to shake the hand of that young Marine.
jd
August 14th, 2010
10:59 pm
Linda, yes, I work for state government for less pay than that of my equivalent position in the private sector. I say that not to complain, I see my work as service. The thesis Kyle proposed was that because of the disparity in average pay between federal workers and private sector workers, we have created two classes of people. Ironically, President Bush was responsible for creating this “class warfare” as he privatized the more common parts of the federal workforce, keeping positions of upper management, specialists, and those whose education, expertise and experience is not that of the average private sector employee. In other words, to compare apples to apples, we must compare the types of jobs now populating the federal work force with equivalent types in the private sector in order for Kyle’s data to begin to support his thesis.
As to how we pay for government and how much we should pay for government — those are arguments that are valid and necessary to have. But, to say that we should impose a “one size fits all cut” to make things equal creates the hazard of “throwing the baby out with the bath water. Blaming the employees for the decisions made by the voters via their duly elected representatives is not the way to run a country.
Not So Casual Observer
August 14th, 2010
11:00 pm
Linda @ 9:34,
Those who will profit directly from the Chicago Climate Exchange:
Al Gore, Franklin Raines, George Soros, Goldman Sachs and the usual Lib suspects.
Have you read the Rolling Stone article on Goldman Sachs?
Linda
August 14th, 2010
11:37 pm
khc @ 10:01, What do you think these headlines have to do with the economic crisis?
1991: Opening Doors to Affordable Housing initiative is launched
1992: Fannie Mae Becomes the largest issuer & guarantor of Mortgage Backed Securities (MBS’s)
1993: Fannie Mae succeeds the Opening Doors goal of producing $10 B in purchases for low & moderated-income needs more than 16 mts. ahead of schedule
1994: Fannie Mae’s Trillion Dollar Commitment is launched targeting housing finance that will serve 10 million low to moderate income families
Fast-forward to 9/30/99 New York Times, 1999!!!!!!!!!!!
“Fannie Mae Eases Credit to Aid Mortgage Lending”
“In a move that would help increase home ownership rates among minorities & low income consumers, the Federal National Mortgage Assn. is easing the credit requirement on loans it will purchase from banks & other lenders…to extend mortgages to individuals whose credit is generally not good enough…the nation’s biggest underwriter of home mortgages, has been under increasing pressure from the Clinton adm. to expand mortgage loans among low & moderate income people…pressing Fannie Mae to help them make loans to so-called subprime borrrowers…is taking on significantly more risk…prompting a govt. rescue…In July (HUD) proposed that by ‘01, 50% of Fannie…& Freddie’s portfolios be made up of loans to low & moderate income borrowers.
All this happened 3 yrs, before Bush was inaugurated.
There’s a lot of blame to go around for the current economic recession & I’m not holding Bush without blame.The main factor has to do with ideology, that home ownership was a right, not merely a privilege & that people who could not qualify needed to be given loans even though they were NINJAS: no income, no jobs & no assets, & it’s still going on as I write. Does that even sound like a conservative principle?
What am I stupid about?
Dusty
August 14th, 2010
11:53 pm
Thank you, Kyle, for writing what so many Americans are saying these days. Government and its expenses are growing like kudzu and smothering this country into a financial coma.
Everybody in the White House and Congress should be beating their brains out trying to cut out trillions from our deficit. They should act, at least, like they know what hard times mean and show us the greatest penny pinching ever done in Washington. It is a matter of saving the ship of state before it sinks.
Keep up the good work, Kyle. Don’t stop. It is getting late.
Linda
August 15th, 2010
12:16 am
jd @ 10:59, Why do you work for the state govt. for less pay than your equivalent position in the private sector?
There are no classes of people, certainly not just 2.
If Bush was responsible for class warfare, then why does it seem than it’s worse under Obama? He seems to be dividing the country even further by pitting the rich against the poor, the CEO’s & Wall St. against Main St., the blacks against the whites, Fox News against the alphabet media, the truly radicals against the Tea Parties, etc. Why is that?
No one is blaming the fed. or state employees for the crisis, except for those whose unions will not work for a solution to solve the crisis. We must work together for a solution. Everyone must give or all will loose.
Linda
August 15th, 2010
12:28 am
Not So @ 11:00, If I read one more article about how Goldman Sacs has profited from this adm., I think I will have a hissy fit. They are so in bed with climate change & financial reform, how could they be in any deeper? I wrote myself a note for tomorrow to research it. Do I have to go to to London or Canada to find the truth?
Are you aware of the patents by Franklin Raines/Fannie Mae for Cap & Trade?
Linda
August 15th, 2010
12:37 am
Congress said, “Let’s end the Bush tax cuts so we will have more money to spend!” Let’s spend our way into oblivion! Now that we’ve convinced the Fed. Reserve to monetize the fed. debt, which they said 6 mts. ago under oath they would never do, we have a free reign at spending. Let’s bankrupt the USA!
Not So Casual Observer
August 15th, 2010
7:38 am
Linda,
Goldman has been “in bed” with administrations since before the Great Depression and the Rolling Stone article lays out their history and participation in every financial disaster since.
The problems we have in the federal government are not an R & D situation, the pols are the same once they reach Washington. Existing only to win the next election they sell us out.
From Thomas Jefferson in 1802:
‘I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around the banks will deprive the people
of all property – until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered.’
Grand Forks
August 15th, 2010
8:26 am
“real cute fork you …..conservatism needs intellec kicked your arse”
Ma’am, I’m not sure if you’re stupid or just stupid.
khc
August 15th, 2010
8:40 am
hey forks, i guess you would have a hard time figuring that out……missy
JADEN
August 15th, 2010
10:20 am
wher you at josef nix???
I looking for you………..
Michael H. Smith
August 15th, 2010
11:24 am
jd
August 14th, 2010
10:59 pm
I have to agree and compliment you on your prerogative in regards to “public service”. Yes, the focus of a government job should be on service first, pay and benefits second. Unfortunately the general character of human nature fails to accommodate the nobility of your individually held perspective.
The public sector verses private sector debate will continue regardless of anything said on this blog as it has for years with liberals wanting more government and conservatives, at least the right thinking conservatives, wanting no more government than is absolutely constitutionally necessary to fulfill its’ obligatory duties to the people.
Part of the problem lies in creating demand for government jobs, which is something neither of the two major political parties seem to have any desire of truly abating given the corrupt nature of the political beast they all serve — e.g. No elected politician appears to ever have the spine to ask why do we need something like a U. S. Postal Service in this age of advanced communications and private sector couriers like UPS and FED EX ?
Anyone see the need to review from time to time the merits of some government agencies existence?
Thanks to our duly elected, be they of the D or R variety, a false if not more so unnecessary “demand” is created for an ever increasing “supply” of government employees. The rules of supply and demand dictates wages and costs in the public sector no differently than it does in the private sector.
To equalize the pay and benefit differences between public and private sector workers the differences in demand will need to be addressed.
Dr. Pangloss
August 15th, 2010
12:18 pm
Do federal workers still enjoy the same pay scale all over the US? Part of this may be because it’s so expensive to live in the DC area. We have a relative who lives in a DC suburb. His very modest home in a pleasant but non-ritzy neighborhood is valued at $340,000.
VA
August 15th, 2010
12:30 pm
Want to see where the “government salaries” are going and too what group, just go to the Fulton County Courthouse. In the private sector, the degree of incompetence would not be tolerated. The attitude of most of these employees is that their jobs are for life. Leaving tax payers in the waiting rooms for the entire lunch hour and waits that are off the chart, not to mention the calibre of government employee. I am a business owner and could only wish that I could just PRINT money to pay my employees. There is one giant pocket book, the taxpayers, and it will continue to pay these wages until the TAXPAYERS demand that it stop or at least be put into line.
AmVet
August 15th, 2010
12:43 pm
Much of the blame for a bloated and inept bureaucracy is well deserved.
Strange though, that the vast percentage of it is directed solely at the federal level. Show me a state-run political machinery that is not just as corrupt, bloated and incompetent. Look no further than Atlanta, my myopic friends, for plenty of evidence, where Pray for Rain and Gang has proven conclusively that the Democrats have no stranglehold on cheap talk, dirty deals and little if any beneficial action. Unless of course, you are one of the newly established American plutocracy.
I’m not sure what the rightist beef is about anyway. You “fiscal conservatives” got exactly what you’ve fought for since the days of Ronnie. An emasculated Uncle Sam and allowing the “free market” to police itself. Full reign. No consequences. Nobody watching the foxes guarding the American hen house. The entrenched incumbency racket of the Tweedledee and Tweedledum Parties turning a paid-off blind eye to staggering white collar crimes and thievery, at a level and scope only heretofore imagined.
Three decades on it is now fully matured and ready to finally replace we the people’s sovereignty with their own.
To the point where unchecked and imperious Wall Street corporatism has brought this nation to her knees and a second depression. And declares any who dare tries to expose their crimes as traitors. When in fact they are the unindicted criminals who hide behind that giant Old Glory on Wall Street. It should be taken down and given to someone more deserving.
Corporate lobbyists by the tens of thousands with billions of dollars, actually writing the legislation that holds them unaccountable for their innumerable misdeeds and at gigantic and needless cost to the American shareholder, taxpayer and consumer. You and me.
Throw in a few hundred million dollars every year in undeserved handouts, giveaways and “subsidies”, and they are now virtually untouchable. At least with these little men in Washington and plenty of other places who lack even a shred of moral courage to stand up to them and actually advocate on behalf of the interests of clobbered middle-class American. Who’ve watched their standard of living grow smaller by the year.
And yet the faithful faux conservatives believe these Titans of Criminal Negligence and Malfeasance and their army of lackeys to be their compassionate, trickle down, job providing benefactors, and the cops and law enforcement – of any kind and at any level – to be the bad guys.
Remember when the Republicans touted themselves as “tough on crime”? What the hell happened? Why and when did the GOP become the Anti-Law & Order Party?
problem solved
August 15th, 2010
12:51 pm
Okay Dusty, oh wise one. Where would you begin to cut the trillions of dollars you suggest? Would it be on the poor down trodden who’s taxes were cut by Bush, altough they are the richest 2% in America, or would it be on the DOD who’s budget is not in this hemispere. Oh I know how about…medicare…social security…programs for the needy…NOW THAT’S
THE TICKET.
retired early
August 15th, 2010
1:09 pm
DO NOT BELIEVE FOR ONE SECOND THAT STATE AND FEDERAL EMPLOYEES MAKE ANYWHERE NEAR THE SAME SALARIES. Go the Georgia job site and see for yourself. Georgia was unable to fill tons of positions due to such low salaries before the recession. Now most are not available due to a hiring freeze. You want one of these GREAT jobs, Their waiting for you.
@@
August 15th, 2010
1:18 pm
Do federal workers still enjoy the same pay scale all over the US? Part of this may be because it’s so expensive to live in the DC area. We have a relative who lives in a DC suburb. His very modest home in a pleasant but non-ritzy neighborhood is valued at $340,000.
I’ve given thought to ^^^ that very thing when considering who it is that Obama deems wealthy. $250,000 if a person’s living in say…..D.C.? New York? California?
The Hispanic Tea Party from Bell City, CA?
The Awakening!
Michael H. Smith
August 15th, 2010
2:05 pm
“You “fiscal conservatives” got exactly what you’ve fought for since the days of Ronnie. An emasculated Uncle Sam and allowing the “free market” to police itself.”
This embolden part of the statement applies to THE OTHER LIBERALS, THE LIBERTARIANS not to any “fiscal conservatives” who understand the commerce section of the Constitution; which does not allow an unfettered capitalism to exist in the capitalist marketplace of this country that these LIBERTARIANS want.
There is no such thing as a so-called “Free Market!”
Where there is manipulation or regulation in whatever form it may take on there can be no “Free Market”. Whether the manipulation or regulation is done by the hand of government or done by the hand of enterprise, freedom in the marketplace is always limited by one or the other.
Dusty
August 15th, 2010
2:11 pm
Problem solved @ 12:51
You are part of the problem. You assume right away that no one in Washington can figure how to cut expenses. They can. They will have to. The money sources are going to run out and all Americans are going to be left “holding the bag”.
You suggested the Department of Defense budget is not in this hemisphere. Maybe you should talk to Defense Secretary Robert Gates who has a proposal coming to Congress to cut out a central command headquarters and a hundred “generals” . They are not needed, he said. It is true that this savings would allow the military to bring innovations to improve the military, but to do it with a plan to absorb the cost, not add to what is there. Gates is thinking like a man who has handled money, a man who realizes what debt actually means.
That is what I want in Washington. People who can manage with less, cut out “fluff” in all departments and act like they know what a 14 trillion dollar debt means. If they can’t figure that out, then we should send someone to Washington who can at least add and subtract.
I cannot go to Washington and instigate cuts in every department. I don’t know the particulars of every department. But there are people in Washington who are supposed to know and they should be making cuts left and right. Politics should be the last thought in financial decisions. We are talking about saving the USA from bankruptcy. That should be more important than politics. .
@@
August 15th, 2010
2:24 pm
Corporate lobbyists by the tens of thousands with billions of dollars, actually writing the legislation that holds them unaccountable for their innumerable misdeeds and at gigantic and needless cost to the American shareholder, taxpayer and consumer. You and me.
Granted, there are those MAJOR players of innumerable misdeeds, but the overzealous enthusiasm to paint ALL business as corrupt has resulted in an economic standstill.
Let’s call it the negative impact of “trickle down regulations”.
Southern Comfort
August 15th, 2010
2:35 pm
For those who really want to know what government workers make, just look at the pay scales yourself.
http://www.opm.gov/oca/10tables/index.asp
My question for Kyle is, when comparing public sector and private sector pay, are you including SES workers in the public sector pay? If you do that, and don’t include upper management pay in private sector pay, you’re not comparing pay on an even level. That would be skewing the numbers to fit your assertion. No one has mentioned that the average worker’s pay has been stagnant over the last decade or two, while the CEO’s pay has multiplied numerous times. The CEO of the federal government only makes $400,000 a year. How many CEO’s in the private sector make more than that?
I’d love nothing more than to see those who complain about government workers try a few of those jobs for a while to see how “glamorous” they really are. The military’s hiring, and I’m sure you can collect a hefty signing bonus depending on which MOS you sign up for. You’ll probably collect hazardous duty pay while dodging explosions and bullets in Afghanistan and Iraq. Or, the Border Patrol is hiring. Take your pick. I think everyone should have to work for the government for a period of time.
problem solved
August 15th, 2010
2:44 pm
Well dusty…As your hero on every occasion once said “there you go again”
“You assume right away that no one in Washington can figure how to cut expenses”.
Yes, my dear I do assume that based on their respective track record…
“Maybe you should talk to Defense Secretary Robert Gates who has a proposal coming to Congress to cut out a central command headquarters and a hundred “generals.”
What a hundred generals…wow what’s that assuming a generals salary is 175,000 per …. Chump change!
How about bringing all the troops home who are fighting ghosts in Afghanistan, and propping up an Iraq government filled with corrupt politicians.
“Gates is thinking like a man who has handled money, a man who realizes what debt actually means”.
Yeah I’m sure Gates is a man who has handled money…Lots of money…Like the billions that went missing in Iraq!
“I cannot go to Washington and instigate cuts in every department. I don’t know the particulars of every department”.
As your hero Ronnie would say there you go again!
Scandalous
August 15th, 2010
3:06 pm
When APS isn’t teaching students how to cheat, they’re sweeping them under the rug.
Atlanta grad rate doesn’t add up
problem solved
August 15th, 2010
4:01 pm
“U.S. military leaders inherited a faulty strategy for the war in Afghanistan at the end of the Bush administration and are still working to “refine the concepts,” the U.S. commander said in an interview airing Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
And Dusty who is this Commander, I believe his name is David Patraeus.
And who was/is the Secretary of defense? Can you say Robert Gates.
When you come to the table Dusty don’t bring BS, as always you are made out to be a fool!
Linda
August 15th, 2010
4:02 pm
Last night I was referred to an article that I found by googling Rolling Stone Goldman Sachs.
http://rollingstone.com/politics/news/12697/64796?RS_show_page=6
Now I understand how a corporation can make a profit of $2 B, pay out $10 B in compensation & benefits ($43 M to their CEO) & pay 1% of their profits ($14 M) in taxes.
I understand how they helped manipulate gas prices to over $4 per gallon in ‘08 when demand was low & supply was up. I already knew their participation in the economic crisis. Their participation in cap & trade is at the end of the article. Read it first.
This article tells you much about what is eating at our country. It should be a wake-up call.
Thank you, Not So.
Dusty
August 15th, 2010
4:32 pm
Problem Solved, 2:44
So, what is your anti-war ID this time? You seem to appear on every blog available. Your white flag has been dragged hither & yon.
We are not fighting ghosts in Afghanistan. Those are the words of cowards who sit home and demean our military while they fight the Taliban. the sidekicks to al Queda. You had rather sit home and cry while the terrorists are kept busy in the Middle East.
You want to mention missing millions in Iraq while forgeting that the UN allowed Saddam ten years to squander millions for “feeding the children”. But that does not bother you. No, you want to make a stab at our military..
Yes, I do believe we can do something in Washington. But the spendthrift now is president Obama, a man without leadership experience. It shows as our country sinks deeper and deeper into his financial “programs”. When are you going to notice that he is president now and stop blaming past presidents for his actions?
We are supposed to be a country of independent people, of self suffiency and freedom loving. That is what I want us to be. That is what I want our government to be.
Dusty
August 15th, 2010
4:49 pm
Problem Solved, 4:01
Just saw your latest tirade. So you want to knock David Petraeus and Robert Gates. Gen. Petraeus served under George W. Bush and led the famous surge so successful in Iraq. As I mentioned, that happened under President Bush.
As to Robert Gates, perhaps you do not know that he has served eight different presidents and some of them were Democrats. He is a smart ethical man and many presidents have felt the need for such a man. He “plays” it straight in all endeavors.. Even President Obama saw that was true.
As to your remarks, I’d rather be a fool for freedom than a nerd for nothing like you. Cheers!
Carpet Kitten
August 15th, 2010
5:08 pm
The week in news:
General Petraeus goes on one of those liberal leaning Sunday morning host shows (you know the ilk like Meet The Depressed: four or five liberal Democrats and one token Conservative – at best) and says things could have been planned in Afghanistan better under the Bush administration. The liberal main stream media and their blog minions of course are running with it. Now you have to remember that these are the same people who snidely called Petraeus “Betrayus” on political blogs when he supported the surge in Iraq during the last two years of the Bush administration. It’s not surprising at their turn of support, really. Different president now.
Rangel has a birthday bash that even Bloomberg attended. It was a fundraiser event. Rangel and his cohorts all but threatened anyone to take him down. And these are the same ilk that strung up and quartered the late Ted Stevens who was later acquitted of ALL of his charges, albeit too late to save his career.
But the real winner of the week is Maxine Waters, aka Max The Knife: Rep. Hot Waters on Friday blamed BUSH for her ethics charges – saying she had to intervene with the US Treasury on for minority-owned banks seeking federal bailout funds. Yeah, like the ones tied to her husband. All because the Treasury Department wouldn’t schedule its own appointments. You truly can’t make this kind of stuff up. Liberal democrats are the gift that keep on giving. Seen the latest Obama and Pelosi/Reid-ocrat poll ratings?
Speaking of Obama, Teleprompter In Chief and family headed to the redneck riviera, aka Panama City Beach in Florida. Well better late than never I suppose. Especially after Queen Antoinette Obama was lambasted in this nation for her flamboyant Spain vacation and not vacationing in the US during a CONTINUING economic crisis under Democrat rule. Where are the Obamas going to vacation next week? Or is Obama this following week going to actually travel around the nation again on a circa-2008 campaign stunt bout and start trashing the Bush administration and Republicans again?
And there’s good news for all the liberal Democrat government lovers out there: While workers’ pay and benefits have fallen stagnate, federal government employees’ pay has grown to more than double what private sector workers earn. Now you have to remember that the Pelosi/Reid-ocrats are going to raise taxes on private business owners, cause companies to shell out unknown higher costs due to their ObamaCare, and continue to push for an even higher minimum wage – to something they call a “livable wage.” And to think the clueless economic buffoons on the left running this nation are telling business owners to create more jobs.
New housing continues to collapse because of tightening credit and Democrats are pushing for banks to give more loans and credit. Yeah, the same credit that the Democrats raked over the coals calling “Big Banking” evil and all in a dog and pony Congressional show earlier this year. Will you people make up your damned minds already?
The US just posted the highest trade deficit in 20 months as GDP growth continues to sputter. Yep, it’s got to be Bush’s fault.
Senator Reid is getting backlash from his comment “I don’t know how anyone of Hispanic heritage could be a Republican, OK. Do I need to say more?” Isn’t that, so, liberal Democrat? Use race to further a political agenda.
Can’t wait for next week’s follies in liberal Democrat land!
problem solved
August 15th, 2010
5:32 pm
Geez Dusty…You might want to read what Patraeus said before accusing me….He said “he had inherited a faulty strategy for the war in Afghanistan at the end of the Bush administration and is still working to “refine the concepts,”
I didn’t say it .. it is a direct quote of General Petraeus…..
”
As to Robert Gates, “perhaps you do not know that he has served eight different presidents and some of them were Democrats. He is a smart ethical man and many presidents have felt the need for such a man. He “plays” it straight in all endeavors.. Even President Obama saw that was true”.
Well I do know one thing about Obama (although I voted for him) he has made some lousy choices in his administration…
And if you are calling me a coward who sits at home, and waves the white flag….in some instances you are correct.
But then you wouldn’t have a clue about war….Never having been in battle, never having to risk your life, and especially that war which is totally uneccesary! Don’t ever tell me about war I’ve been there,
done that.
Carpet Kitten
August 15th, 2010
5:35 pm
“But then you wouldn’t have a clue about war….Never having been in battle, never having to risk your life, and especially that war which is totally uneccesary! Don’t ever tell me about war I’ve been there, done that.”
Most people who have ever served with honor do not brag about it nor use it as a crutch for political – or argument – sake. I throw the BS flag on “problem solved.”
problem solved
August 15th, 2010
5:43 pm
Oh do you Carpet Kitten….I was not bragging just pointing out a simple fact…..
Carpet Kitten
August 15th, 2010
5:51 pm
Well “problem solved”…for someone who claims to have served in combat you sure aren’t defending your alleged service very well.
And yes, I stand by my BS flag. It’s up to you to remove it. Now, do you have any other comments about what I’ve posted here? Put up or shut up, liberal.
problem solved
August 15th, 2010
6:14 pm
A little story for you CARPET KITTEN….because you are very wise, and seem to know how a veteran reacts.
Years ago 1974 I was flying fighting forest fires for the BLM (bureau of land mangagement) out of Boise Idaho….There were about 15 pilots who partied together, and had a lot of fun together. Everyone was a high time pilot having aquired their time in Vietnam. No one ever spoke about their time served or where one was stationed…or the medals that were cast upon us. We just knew that we all had survived.
Years later after work I came home and turned on the TV…There was this
guy who I knew very well walking across the stage where President Bush
hung the medal of honor around his neck…his name Ed Freeman…No one
knew…as we all had hung around the bar together what an accomplishment this fine soldier had accomplished. Where he saved untold lives at the Ia Drang Valley. Nobody knew because it went without speaking…..but, when someone like Dusy challenges your courage, ones valor….Screw that sh*t…!!!!
You are right in your assertion “Most people who have ever served with honor do not brag about it nor use it as a crutch for political – or argument – sake. I throw the BS flag on “problem solved”.”
But had you bothered to read the post you would find nowhere was I bragging or using my experience as a crutch!