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Poster: “In the last five years senior managers rose by 0.4% (one half of one percent)!!!”

Article: “...Federal workers earning $150,000 or more make up 3.9% of the workforce, up from 0.4% in 2005.”

I’m coming up with an increase of 3.5% of the workforce, or a nearly ninefold increase in five years.

Anecdotal I can tell you that I don't know of any federal office that has seen a nine fold increase in five years. Our staff was exactly where it was five years ago while we have been asked to do more and more. We are so stretched to the bone that if anyone gets sick there is no one to replace them. One guy just had his appendics removed and had to come back after a few days of rest. I told them they better hope that I don't get hit by a bus because I do finances. :O)

Mine you, I'm not complaining. After all, we are working. And I'm not saying that I'd disagree with the concept of furlows or reduce pay to help the deficit-as long as 1) there are REAL spending cuts, 2) controls are put into place to make sure no more deficit spending and 3) cuts are across the board. If you want to cut feds you got to cut military (funding and salaries), and farmers, and entitlements, and .....

The grass is always greener on the other side.

Article: “...Federal workers earning $150,000 or more make up 3.9% of the workforce, up from 0.4% in 2005.”

I’m coming up with an increase of 3.5% of the workforce, or a nearly ninefold increase in five years.

There's a reason for that apparent (but nonexistant) contradiction, which was spelled out in an article I read about 6-8 months ago.

The salaries of career civil servants and political appointees is capped - indexed to how much the head of a department or agency makes. So the most senior SESers at an agency can't make more than the head of the agency.

What happened was that Congress raised the salaries for the heads of the agencies (which are usually indexed/capped to how much Members of Congress/Senators make), without "fixing" the indexing cap for the down-organization staffers. So when the heads of agencies got their pay increases, all the senior staffers who had maxed out because of the index/cap automatically got big pay increases as well.