Were lots of DC-area professionals overpaid?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I know some people aren't going to like hearing this but USAID wasn't just feeding poor kids in Africa. That was only a tiny percentage of USAID work and actually still goes on under State.

Most of USAID was pet projects and donor causes f9r liberals and an entire NGO industry grew up around it, often started by former USAIDers. And when something like that happens, you find a lot of cronyism. It's sort of comparable to big city government machines finding plum jobs and sinecures for their supporters. And it went unchecked and unregulated, so admin salaries at the NGOs exploded. Some founders became quite rich acting as contractors. And while some good projects happened, a lot of it was dubious and just another way to slosh billions around consultants and contractors with people feeding from the trough both in DC and on the ground overseas and the % that actually ended up being used for genuinely good outcomes is much smaller than most people realize. And USAID was definitely used to indirectly send money undercover to entities overseas.

USAID did become a liberal sinecure entity, using taxpayer dollars to effectively reward liberal supporters and connections. It's why the Trump administration moved so fast to shut it down. And it's also why no one is missing USAID. Only maybe 1% genuinely ended up helping villagers in developing countries.

I'm sorry for the people in the article but the whole industry was rampant with cronyism and out of touch.

100

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:IDK 272K is outrageous for a non-profit.

Go read the 990 tax forms of non profits. For many of the so-called trade associations, the executive director/ceo makes millions.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:IDK 272K is outrageous for a non-profit.

Go read the 990 tax forms of non profits. For many of the so-called trade associations, the executive director/ceo makes millions.

Who pays these salaries? Members's dues of the trade associations? Or the government? Genuinely curious.

[Anonymous]

USAID wasn't a non-profit. You cannot live here and think that. You realize that there is a standard government pay scale? People work between Treasury, State, USAID and DoD sometimes, do you expect someone whose skills progressively improve to be paid based on the communities served by the agency? GTFOH.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:IDK 272K is outrageous for a non-profit.

Go read the 990 tax forms of non profits. For many of the so-called trade associations, the executive director/ceo makes millions.

Who pays these salaries? Members's dues of the trade associations? Or the government? Genuinely curious.

Members’ dues.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There's a story in the NY Times about the dramatic decline in fortunes of some workers following the collapse of USAID. This is not to be harsh, but if you were making $272,000 a year at a nonprofit, and now you're interviewing for $19-an-hour retail jobs, isn't that a clear indication from the broader job market that you were overpaid?

People over here are drastically disillusioned by how tax receipts support their cushy lifestyles off the backs of hard working Americans. The rest of us make much less.

Some of the posts here are nauseating: “Omg we have to share an office.” “Omg we have to write an email.” “Omg we actually have to go to the office.” “Omg we should never be laid off as government employees that’s for civilian pions”

People "over here"? Where are you?

I'm convinced most of the posters on the jobs forum are not in the DC area and have no idea what a professional non-sales office is like.

+100. Whenever I see some of these comments that I can’t fathom ever hearing from people I interact with in person, I remember that the people making the comments aren’t the type of people I interact with in person because they don’t actually live here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I know some people aren't going to like hearing this but USAID wasn't just feeding poor kids in Africa. That was only a tiny percentage of USAID work and actually still goes on under State.

Most of USAID was pet projects and donor causes f9r liberals and an entire NGO industry grew up around it, often started by former USAIDers. And when something like that happens, you find a lot of cronyism. It's sort of comparable to big city government machines finding plum jobs and sinecures for their supporters. And it went unchecked and unregulated, so admin salaries at the NGOs exploded. Some founders became quite rich acting as contractors. And while some good projects happened, a lot of it was dubious and just another way to slosh billions around consultants and contractors with people feeding from the trough both in DC and on the ground overseas and the % that actually ended up being used for genuinely good outcomes is much smaller than most people realize. And USAID was definitely used to indirectly send money undercover to entities overseas.

USAID did become a liberal sinecure entity, using taxpayer dollars to effectively reward liberal supporters and connections. It's why the Trump administration moved so fast to shut it down. And it's also why no one is missing USAID. Only maybe 1% genuinely ended up helping villagers in developing countries.

I'm sorry for the people in the article but the whole industry was rampant with cronyism and out of touch.

100

The destruction of USAID was estimated to have caused 600,000 deaths as of last November. Probably at least 1 million by now

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There's a story in the NY Times about the dramatic decline in fortunes of some workers following the collapse of USAID. This is not to be harsh, but if you were making $272,000 a year at a nonprofit, and now you're interviewing for $19-an-hour retail jobs, isn't that a clear indication from the broader job market that you were overpaid?

People over here are drastically disillusioned by how tax receipts support their cushy lifestyles off the backs of hard working Americans. The rest of us make much less.

Some of the posts here are nauseating: “Omg we have to share an office.” “Omg we have to write an email.” “Omg we actually have to go to the office.” “Omg we should never be laid off as government employees that’s for civilian pions”

People "over here"? Where are you?

I'm convinced most of the posters on the jobs forum are not in the DC area and have no idea what a professional non-sales office is like.

+100. Whenever I see some of these comments that I can’t fathom ever hearing from people I interact with in person, I remember that the people making the comments aren’t the type of people I interact with in person because they don’t actually live here.

The site should stay anonymous but it should post your location so we know to ignore the ignoramuses from Nowhere, Nebraska.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Get back to us when your whole industry goes away, OP.

This. The job market in this geographic area is damaged by DOGE and the job market in her specific field was destroyed. That doesn't mean she was overpaid for the work she did before that happened. It means the world changed.

It was a fake job market, a big scam to funnel money to an industry that shouldn't exist except to fund itself.

[Anonymous]

I was fired from my job at USAID. I worked in the woodchuck department. We were so close to finding out how much wood would a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood. Now we will probably never know.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:A 57 year old not finding a new equivalent job after a layoff is not a new thing.

How about the rest of us 18 - 56 year olds who never reached that level...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I was fired from my job at USAID. I worked in the woodchuck department. We were so close to finding out how much wood would a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood. Now we will probably never know.

Closing USAID has had a severe, mostly immediate humanitarian impact on the people who depended on its programs: loss of food aid, medical care, clean water, education support, and refugee protection. Reported effects include treatment interruptions, service shutdowns, higher disease risk, and funding gaps that local partners cannot quickly fill.

[Anonymous]

USAID got killed because Elon was following Mike Benz on twitter and believed in his conspiracy theories. A lot of people died as a result.

This did not happen because of corruption, and if you actually care about corruption, you should be livid every single day at this administration.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:USAID got killed because Elon was following Mike Benz on twitter and believed in his conspiracy theories. A lot of people died as a result.

This did not happen because of corruption, and if you actually care about corruption, you should be livid every single day at this administration.

But it’s only corruption when it’s people I don’t like that are doing it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There's a story in the NY Times about the dramatic decline in fortunes of some workers following the collapse of USAID. This is not to be harsh, but if you were making $272,000 a year at a nonprofit, and now you're interviewing for $19-an-hour retail jobs, isn't that a clear indication from the broader job market that you were overpaid?

People over here are drastically disillusioned by how tax receipts support their cushy lifestyles off the backs of hard working Americans. The rest of us make much less.

Some of the posts here are nauseating: “Omg we have to share an office.” “Omg we have to write an email.” “Omg we actually have to go to the office.” “Omg we should never be laid off as government employees that’s for civilian pions”

People "over here"? Where are you?

I'm convinced most of the posters on the jobs forum are not in the DC area and have no idea what a professional non-sales office is like.

+100. Whenever I see some of these comments that I can’t fathom ever hearing from people I interact with in person, I remember that the people making the comments aren’t the type of people I interact with in person because they don’t actually live here.

The site should stay anonymous but it should post your location so we know to ignore the ignoramuses from Nowhere, Nebraska.

Agree. Though then the jobs forum might dry up entirely.