Why so much vitriol toward Federal employees?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Stop watching Fox News and you'll get some accurate information. Study after study has shown that most federal workers make significantly LESS than their private sector counterparts. The one exception to this rule is administrative staff, clerical workers, and secretaries - they tend to make somewhat more than their private counterparts.

You are welcome.



Actually I heard this in a WTOP broadcast. Do they also have an agenda? Serious question.



PP here.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2010-03-04-federal-pay_N.htm

Did you actually read that article?? It repeated my point. Administrative staff (clerical, janitors, cooks, etc.) make more than their private counterparts. Other specializes employees - lawyers, pilots, engineers, etc.--tend to make less than their private counterparts. It also added that there are many jobs for which there IS no private sector equivalent against which to make an informed analysis.

If you think your articled backed up your point, there is no point in continuing this discussion because you misread and misinterpret information.

The article states that "Accountants, nurses, chemists, surveyors, cooks, clerks and janitors are among the wide range of jobs that get paid more on average in the federal government than in the private sector. "

Chemists???? I wouldn't call Accountants, nurses, and chemists "administrative" employees.

[Anonymous]

(Banging my head against my desk)

Ok. You win. You are always right, because you can twist one piece of information to back your ill-informed point.

Though some critics question their accuracy, government analyses show that federal employees make on average 24 percent less than their private-sector counterparts. The Congressional Research Service reported in 2009 that private industry pays higher salaries than the government for PhD-level employees in computer science, information science, mathematics, statistics, biological sciences, environmental life sciences, chemistry, economics, and civil, architectural, electrical and computer engineering. In addition, the average private-sector salary in 2010 for a recent college graduate was $48,661. Entry-level federal workers start at $34,075, or $42,209 for candidates with superior academic achievement.

On the other hand, some federal blue-collar and clerical workers are paid more than those in the private sector. The ongoing debate about federal pay, however, does not address the root problem: The government does not have a pay system flexible enough to recruit the best talent and pay in accordance with the market.

Here is a link to that study.
http://www.policyarchive.org/handle/10207/bitstreams/18897.pdf

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:(Banging my head against my desk)

Ok. You win. You are always right, because you can twist one piece of information to back your ill-informed point.

Though some critics question their accuracy, government analyses show that federal employees make on average 24 percent less than their private-sector counterparts. The Congressional Research Service reported in 2009 that private industry pays higher salaries than the government for PhD-level employees in computer science, information science, mathematics, statistics, biological sciences, environmental life sciences, chemistry, economics, and civil, architectural, electrical and computer engineering. In addition, the average private-sector salary in 2010 for a recent college graduate was $48,661. Entry-level federal workers start at $34,075, or $42,209 for candidates with superior academic achievement.

On the other hand, some federal blue-collar and clerical workers are paid more than those in the private sector. The ongoing debate about federal pay, however, does not address the root problem: The government does not have a pay system flexible enough to recruit the best talent and pay in accordance with the market.

Here is a link to that study.
http://www.policyarchive.org/handle/10207/bitstreams/18897.pdf

So first you say, "stop listening to Fox" and you'll get the real skinny. So I point you to a random USA today article.
Then you say I am misinterpreting the article. Which actually, I am not. As I summarized, the USA today article does NOT reinforce your point about "administrative" workers being THE class of employee that is more highly paid than their private sector counterparts.
So now instead of misinterpreting the USA today article, the problem is I need to read this OTHER article you are citing. OK. It does make a good case for the point about some (many?) govt positions being underpaid.

While the article you ultimately cited is informative, thank you, your hostile, sarcastic tone and YOUR misinterpretations hardly bolster your case. Not sure why you are such a jerk.

Besides, I thought you weren't going to bother talking to me anymore since there's no point trying to educate and idiot?

Thanks.

[Anonymous]

To the two combatants here, from a neutral bystander.

It seems to me that both of you are well-informed (at least compared to me) and that you are disagreeing about a fairly straight-forward question. You are citing relevant articles to advance your positions. In almost all respects this would be a model discussion if not for the personal attacks.

I have tried to come up with a reason for these gratuitous attacks and have finally come up with what I think is a credible hypothesis: You do it to amuse bystanders like me. So, thanks for the show!

[Anonymous]

Because it's much easier for politicians to try to point a finger at federal employees as the reason we are out of money and need to cut back. This is baloney for anyone that's seen how the federal budget shakes out. It's not like a normal company where most of your costs are in personnel and certainly not when you're excluding military from the equation. By far the vast majority of the costs are the checks our government writes for SS, medicare and Medicaid. That is where the money is going. Since Medicare and Medicaid are not fire-walled the same way SS is, that is where any real effort to cut the deficit/debt needs to focus.

But that will enrage old people who vote vote vote (since what else are they going to do on a work day) and so nobody wants to talk about that. Much easier to point the finger at "greedy feds". And no, I'm not a federal employee - just fed up with the ignoring of the obvious in terms of what's really driving the cost curve.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Because it's much easier for politicians to try to point a finger at federal employees as the reason we are out of money and need to cut back. This is baloney for anyone that's seen how the federal budget shakes out. It's not like a normal company where most of your costs are in personnel and certainly not when you're excluding military from the equation. By far the vast majority of the costs are the checks our government writes for SS, medicare and Medicaid. That is where the money is going. Since Medicare and Medicaid are not fire-walled the same way SS is, that is where any real effort to cut the deficit/debt needs to focus.

But that will enrage old people who vote vote vote (since what else are they going to do on a work day) and so nobody wants to talk about that. Much easier to point the finger at "greedy feds". And no, I'm not a federal employee - just fed up with the ignoring of the obvious in terms of what's really driving the cost curve.

They aren't pointing the finger. Remember Congress gave up their own increase in 2010 and again in 2011. The issue is the public. How do you tell the public that while everyone is facing hardship and the budget deficits are at an all-time high, that you are handing out pay increases? You are right about the budget, but the average citizen does not believe that the government is taking the budget issue seriously if the people who tax them and allocate their money (Congress) and spend their money (the federal bureaucracy) are still raising their own pay.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:"At my agency, the admin staff basically looks at their career as a job-rights bill and does nothing all day long. They get offended when you ask them to do something."

Sounds like the HR office where I work. They do like to plan parties, though.

Sounds like both of you work for the feds. Would you say that you yourselves do no work, or are you just bashing the admins?

And frankly, the admins' jobs look really boring now that we've done away with computers. They spend their lives entering our time sheets and ordering supplies, and there are only a few left anyway.

[mdurbanmom]

I think it is not so much that federal workers aren't good workers, I just think that the vast majority of them are in the wrong jobs.

As Dave Ramsey says, a good organization isn't just getting the right workers on the right bus, it is getting the right workers in the right seats on the right bus.

It's called efficiency and some parts of the government just aren't run well.

When I was in high school back in the 70s, I had the chance to take the civil service exam. I purposely did not because I didn't want to get pigeon-holed into what I thought would be a dead-end job. And a lot of the GSA workers just looked dead to me. They wander around those windowless buildings and just looked pale and listless. Bored. When you're bored...just just aren't productive. Some of my former classmates are still in those jobs and haven't moved up or even made a lateral move in 25+ years. Ugh.

Are they overpaid? I don't know. I just know you couldn't pay me to work in a federal office. Ever.

[Anonymous]

At least for lawyers, a move to the government has traditionally been a move to a lower paying job. Almost universally, I would say. And in 2004, I cut my pay in half to make that move. In the years following, bonuses at the large NYC firm I left were the highest in the market - around 50k on average and as high as 110k that one famous year when the awarded the superstars special bonuses. And that is in addition to the fat salaries.

I don't really mind the pay freeze. I just think that to say we should be grateful to have our jobs is unfair and nonsensical. I have a job because I took a pay cut in return for job security. Many of my colleagues did not make that move, continued to out-earn me significantly, and some of them got laid off in the last year. They made a choice, and so did I. Any of them could have come to the fed gov back then.

[Anonymous]

I was a federal worker for 11 years and finally left because I just could not stand it any longer. I am happy to confirm that there are most certainly a lot of folks who do next to nothing all day and still get good performance appraisals and pay raises each year. There are folks like this in the private sector too, although when times get tough they are more likely to be fired.

But most feds work incredibly hard each day. The problem is that they are working hard at things that accomplish absolutely nothing of value ... their heart is in the right place but the bureaucracy they work in has them doing unbelievably inefficient, ineffective things most of the time. So while most government programs have worthy goals (safe drugs, safe food, well-educated children, and on and on), the number of human bodies trying to achieve these goals doing often unrelated activities is just frustrating.

Feds are NOT underpaid, because if it were so, they would leave and get a different job. Even in good economic conditions with a healthy job market, they stay. That's all you need to know on that subject.

[Anonymous]

Feds are NOT underpaid, because if it were so, they would leave and get a different job. Even in good economic conditions with a healthy job market, they stay. That's all you need to know on that subject.

By this take, then, everyone is in it for the money. Nothing about a sense of duty, interest in serving, or a higher sense of duty. That may be true for you, but not for everyone. Explain to me federal lawyers under your rationale.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Feds are NOT underpaid, because if it were so, they would leave and get a different job. Even in good economic conditions with a healthy job market, they stay. That's all you need to know on that subject.

By this take, then, everyone is in it for the money. Nothing about a sense of duty, interest in serving, or a higher sense of duty. That may be true for you, but not for everyone. Explain to me federal lawyers under your rationale.

NP here. Several lawyers have already spoken on various Fed threads. The answers are typically stability and hours. I am sure that there are some Fed employees who are there for a sense of duty, but seriously, what percentage do you think that is?

[Anonymous]

By this take, then, everyone is in it for the money. Nothing about a sense of duty, interest in serving, or a higher sense of duty. That may be true for you, but not for everyone. Explain to me federal lawyers under your rationale.



NP here. Several lawyers have already spoken on various Fed threads. The answers are typically stability and hours. I am sure that there are some Fed employees who are there for a sense of duty, but seriously, what percentage do you think that is?

What percentage does it need to be?

Look, either they are not underpaid, or they are underpaid and fine with it because of stability. Or . . . perhaps money and stability aren't motivating factors for working for the government. Do you think people join the marines because of the money and stability? Do you think Secretary Gates is running the Pentagon for the money?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

By this take, then, everyone is in it for the money. Nothing about a sense of duty, interest in serving, or a higher sense of duty. That may be true for you, but not for everyone. Explain to me federal lawyers under your rationale.



NP here. Several lawyers have already spoken on various Fed threads. The answers are typically stability and hours. I am sure that there are some Fed employees who are there for a sense of duty, but seriously, what percentage do you think that is?

What percentage does it need to be?

Look, either they are not underpaid, or they are underpaid and fine with it because of stability. Or . . . perhaps money and stability aren't motivating factors for working for the government. Do you think people join the marines because of the money and stability? Do you think Secretary Gates is running the Pentagon for the money?

Gates is Secretary of Defense, that's different. And many people join the military to defend their country. But if you want to know what the military thinks is a good reason to join, take a look at their advertising:

We don't ask for experience. We give it. You won't read it in a book. You'll live it.
Be all that you can be.
Get an edge on life in the Army.
Accelerate your life.
Aim High.
Then there were the ads about kids going to the military in order to pay for college. They were using those during the war.

The Marine Corps has always pushed its exclusivity with "The Few. The Proud. The Marines". But most of the marines I know were still looking for a career when they went in. Yes, duty is part of it. But they weren't all sacrificing their personal career objectives in order to defend the nation, either. Most of the ones I know felt like they needed to get their act together and do something with their lives, and the Marine Corp gave them that chance.

If you ask me the percentage who are giving up other opportunities primarily for the sake of duty to country, I'd say fewer than 5%. It's hard to say "I am a medical records administrator at the VA because I felt the call to serve my country". Most government jobs are like that.

[Anonymous]

If you ask me the percentage who are giving up other opportunities primarily for the sake of duty to country, I'd say fewer than 5%. It's hard to say "I am a medical records administrator at the VA because I felt the call to serve my country". Most government jobs are like that.

And medical records administrators are among those who are probably paid as well as or better than their private sector counterparts. They fall into the broader category of administrative jobs. I don't know what % of jobs are administrative in the government, but I can tell you that at the agencies I've worked at, most of the people aren't there for the money. I worked for the FBI - the agents and intel analysts were not there because they were making the big bucks. What is your life worth to you? Would you put it on the line regularly, day in and day out, for $60K a year? How about the officers at other intel agencies? Do you think the CIA officers put themselves at grave risk conducting illegal activities in other countries--where if you get caught, you will be tortured, if you are lucky--because of the pay and job security?