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Posted on 01/29/2010 8:28:59 AM PST by milwguy
The average federal salary (including benefits) is set to grow from $72,800 in 2008 to $75,419 in 2010, CBS reported. But the real action isn’t in what government employees are being paid today; it’s in what they’re being promised for tomorrow. Public pensions have swollen to unrecognizable proportions during the last decade. In June 2005, BusinessWeek reported that “more than 14 million public servants and 6 million retirees are owed $2.37 trillion by more than 2,000 different states, cities and agencies,” numbers that have risen since then. State and local pension payouts, the magazine found, had increased 50 percent in just five years.
These huge pension increases have eaten away at public finances, most spectacularly in California, where a bipartisan bill that passed virtually without debate unleashed the odious “3 percent at 50” retirement plan in 1999. Under this plan, at age 50 many categories of public employees are eligible for 3 percent of their final year’s pay multiplied by the number of years they’ve worked. So if a police officer starts working at age 20, he can retire at 50 with 90 percent of his final salary until he dies, and then his spouse receives that money for the rest of her life. Even during the economic crisis, “3 percent at 50” and the forces behind it have only become more entrenched.
(Excerpt) Read more at reason.com ...
I have acquaintances in the gov't sector who are gaming the system by collaborating with their fellow workers to put in lots of overtime in the last three years before retirement in order to inflate the base rate which their pension is based upon.
While private sector employees will have to work to 65,66, or 67 before they retire, many of my acquaintances will be retiring in their 50's with pensions and health care benefits which are nothing short of outrageous.
As the article states, the costs of these benefits are going up exponentially and swamping the ability of gov't to pay them. Something has to give, and when the few people who actually pay taxes to pay these benefits realize how we have been screwed by the new 'royalty', it will not be pretty.
In California unfunded pension and health care liabilities for state workers top $100 billion, and the annual pension contribution has shot up from $320 million to $7.3 billion in less than a decade.
THINK ABOUT THAT FOR A MOMENT! The State itself said this on Nov 30th.........The budget problem consists of a $6.3 billion projected deficit for 2009–10 and a $14.4 billion gap between projected revenues and spending in 2010–11.....
If you examine those numbers you see the INCREASE in pension costs if responsible for 2/3rd of the budget deicit for the next two years....
Truly shocking stats, but illustrative of how quickly things have spun out of control/.
http://www.amazon.com/Plunder-Employee-Treasuries-Controlling-Bankrupting/dp/0984275207
Plunder: How Public Employee Unions are Raiding Treasuries, Controlling Our Lives and Bankrupting the Nation (Paperback)
~ Steven Greenhut (Author)
Also, if you understand the premise (collapse the system from within, Cloward-Pivens, “In Praise of Barbarians”, “Unjust Desserts”, etc) the economy HAS to be collapsed for Obama to implement his new ‘Foundation” for the economy.
We are in dangerous times. Some people don’t want to admit it.
Remember, it never is...pretty...
Job Growth Lacking in the Private Sector (over the last decade)
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/08/business/economy/08charts.html
Despite budget cuts and layoff warnings, California still hiring and workforce still growing
http://www.sacbee.com/politics/story/2094403.html
The Sacramento Bee
Aug. 9, 2009
The job growth for state workers contrasts with the loss of 759,000
jobs in California’s private industry in the past 12 months
http://www.mercurynews.com/topstories/ci_12984385?nclick_check=1&forced=true
not to mention gubermint employees and their pensions:
Reform advocates are spotlighting those with extravagant pensions
— $100,000 or more — as a way to get the public’s attention and
emphasize that the current system is unsustainable.
http://www.modbee.com/editorials/story/803636.html
CHART OF THE DAY: How The Government Payroll Replaced Goods-Producing Jobs
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2422342/posts
Beyond reckless / Sacramento, Washington pile up the debt
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/2009/dec/24/beyond-reckless-sacramento-washington-pile-debt/
House votes 218-214 for short-term debt ceiling increase
CHART OF THE DAY: Bureaucrats Have Way Better Benefits Than You
http://www.businessinsider.com/chart-of-the-day-employer-cost-per-hour-worker-2009-12
http://biggovernment.com/2009/10/03/the-federalist-papers-federalist-no-1/
These chicks make some good points.
“the obvious interest of a certain class of men in every State to resist all changes which may hazard a diminution of the power, emolument, and consequence of the offices they hold under the State establishments”
bump
Look at any state's budget and government education is the budget elephant sleeping in the living room.
A solution would be to move to tax credits, vouchers, and charters provided they would be given the option to hire non-government teachers.
No kidding. It’s difficult for older workers to find any job. In many cases, they end up working for much less pay than they received in their previous jobs. Time to look for that government job!
The first thing our new Congress should do is to correct this. The private sector is much more valuable than the government and unions who lie and use their members.
It’s important to differentiate between state/local employees and federal employees.
Benefits for federal employees and retirees are funded out of the Treasury. If more money is needed to fund those obligations, more money can be printed.
States and localities can’t print money, so obligations for their employees have to come out of state/local taxes.
Big difference!
I was a paramedic in 1980 making about 21k. I was hired into law enforcement at 15k. The reason I took the 25% hit was due to the possibility of retiring at an age where I could enjoy retirement, better job security, and better opportunities. Plus I always wanted to be a cop. Point: there are still a couple of people working for my former employee, my age or older.
Over the years we obtained certain benefits in lieu of raises and one was improvement of pensions. In reality, from 1980 to 2005 when I retired, pensions were improved very little. However, we were able to maintain other benefits. Many years we took 1/2 the raises that were being offered by the private sector to maintain our benefits.
I have worked all but the last 12 months since retirement. The biggest block is jobs. As a Chief, I was less involved in routine patrol but did have my share of arrests.
Law enforcement is an interesting position in that you could have 60 year old officers dealing with 20 year old violent offenders. Not a good combination. I had a 60 year old officer working for me and he basically did nothing. I tried to remove him but his wifeon the council orchestrated a move in which I was the one who left!
I am also a trained fire fighter. I can see many positions in the fire department that can be managed by older firefighters. In fact, I had 70 year old guys who either ran the pumpers or shuttled air packs. A job that needs to be done. The younger guys were the hose draggers who fought the fires.
I concur that the current pension system is out of control. But the reality is that many of us entered the job when the pay was poor and we entered it for a variety of reasons. I can speak from both sides of the negotiation table that a lot of fault lies with municipal management.
Funding of pensions is based on actuarial tables which were establised in the 1960’s. In theory only a small amount has to be paid in order to ‘fully fund’ the pension system. The average police or fire retiree lived on 3 years after retirement in the 1960’s. Now they live 2 decades or more. This is in thanks to better health awareness and a stronger focus on fitness.
Municipal managers did not and would not fund one penny more than absolutely necessary. Fortunately new management took over a few years ago and the funding was increased above what the actuarial tables recommended.
My former agency (the one I retired from) just took a 0% raise, a change in health care for a two year contract. I applaud their action in recognizing current economic trends. I suspect that we will see roll backs if not continued wage freezes when their contract expired in 2011.
I do not support holding the line or demanding pay increases. As usual, it seems that poor decisions were made in the past that are driving a lot of the current problems. Again I mentioned that I have sat on both sides of the table and I know the issues. It will get a lot worse before it gets better.
Of course, I in in Middle America and not east or west coast where the issues are very combative in this arena. We are funded locally and not on a state wide system. This allows better flexibility.
Yes, these pensions look bad but consider the nature of the jobs some of these public employees do. Most of these early retirements are public safety. Other municipal employees do have to work until they are late 50’s or 60 years of age.
The idiots in Oregon voted this week to raise their personal income tax rate to one of the highest in the nation, and raise taxes on businesses, so as to give public employees a nice big raise. Of course, public employees already make 1/3 more than private sector workers and have better benefits - but hey, I’m sure they really deserved it.
We need to keep the pressure on all our politicos and have them cancel or not renew the union contracts , contract most all Gov. services to private co.
No gubMint employees = No overpaid power hungry gubMint workers, No golden retirement pensions ...........
Explain too me how exempting all gubMint employees from the law, that all the other citizens are subjected too, is not a violation of the 14th Amend. , The Equal Protection Under the Law Clause ?
If that does not work we need too put a referendum on the ballot too implement these polices
No matter how well intentioned, Government agency’s/programs turn into a cesspool of graft & corruption
Are govt employees, including every branch of law enforcement, education, infrastructure, and bureaucracy, guaranteed jobs, pensions, overtime, and retirement at an age less than 70?
"On the other hand, it will be equally forgotten that the vigor of government is essential to the security of liberty; that, in the contemplation of a sound and well-informed judgment, their interest can never be separated; and that a dangerous ambition more often lurks behind the specious mask of zeal for the rights of the people than under the forbidden appearance of zeal for the firmness and efficiency of government. History will teach us that the former has been found a much more certain road to the introduction of despotism than the latter, and that of those men who have overturned the liberties of republics, the greatest number have begun their career by paying an obsequious court to the people; commencing demagogues, and ending tyrants."
“Bigger government means more government employees. Those employees then become a permanent lobby for continual government growth. The nation may have reached critical mass...”
Yes, there is a huge conflict of interest here. It would have been helpful if the Constitution had stated that government could not vote for its own growth without at least a 2/3 vote of both the House and the Senate. No new government programs with federal workers unless agreed upon with that type of majority.
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