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 ...
Can these “promises” be broken on the Federal or state levels or is the taxpayer stuck?
Deo Vindice.
You’re not going to get any sympathy from me. You’re complaining about having a job that paid $21,000 per year plus benefits in 1980? That was a pretty good deal in 1980, given that in 1980 the average income was $19,000.
molon labe
Another important thing to spell out -
In 1982-1983 - the Federal retirement system was modified, and it is no where near as generous as some State or local government retirement systems, and it can’t be “gamed” as much either. (And I am speaking of generic Fed program, not one for special employees like Air Traffic Controllers, certain federal police, etc.)
The new federal retirement system provides 1% per year credit - after working 30 years, the retirement is 30% of the average of the last 3 years BASE pay. Overtime can’t be used as a part of that computation. Retirement age is being increased above 55.... There are other factors too - but the FERS program is no where as lucrative as what some cities in California provide!
LEOs are the worst offenders for this kind of pension abuse. File clerks and maintenance workers aren’t getting 3% at 50; they usually see 2% at 55. LEOs and fire, which includes at least five close family members and a dozen more close friends, work the system like no others. They play up the dangers of the job, ignoring the fact that there are many jobs as dangerous if not more so. I have a friend who is a babysitter, I mean prison guard, who gets paid over $100K with overtime, etc. What the prison guard union did to California, with the help of Gov Gray Davis, was highway robbery.
This also distorted by the number of “public servants” who go on disability. In Montgomery County Maryland an incredible number of police just so happen to develop back problems in their last several years of “service”. They sometimes draw more than their pensions for disability. Many times they leave the area to take other “public service” positions and double dip. What a scam on the tax payer.
The ironic thing is that a lot of government agencies won’t take you if you’re past a certain age. The FBI won’t hire anyone over the age of 36, even for office positions. They can discriminate openly and get away with it.
Public servants...have become the perpetual mandarin class...which ran China India Russai etc. into the ground.
First step in reform: bust up their unions
Wasn’t it JFK that allowed them to become unionized?
FWIW my wife (a school principal) is 12 year younger than I, and we will retire in the same year....assuming that a) I live that long and b) if there’s anything left of my private pensions and 401k’s in 2027. Our salaries are within a few dollars of each other....for now She will pass me this year because her raises are 4-5%. Hell, last year the company didn’t give out raises and this year I’m going to assume more of the same. She will retire on a pretty fat pension at 55.
We remark upon the prescience of the late C. Northcote Parkinson, who predicted in his very witty way that this would be our downfall.
The teachers health insurance at retirement is still at the district level, they are part of the district's group, and is paid for by the individuals-not the state or the district.
The teachers pay into a retirement system with an employee match that is managed by trustees who hire several money managers to invest the dollars which includes stocks, bonds, and other investments. It is reviewed each year to make sure it is actuarially sound. I do not see this as a big drain.
I actually taught until my children were old enough to go to school, and then I left to work in banking at a much larger salary and way more fringe benefits. Many of the people who I taught with were hardworking and dedicated with traditional conservative values.
I just can not paint them with the same brush as the urban teachers who belong to the NEA.
If the government guts medicare, I may go back to teaching long enough to qualify for their insurance at retirement, even though it will cost more than medicare.
Good points. I don’t like the scapegoating that sometimes occurs on these threads. There is a big difference between the local and state employees and the members of the public employee unions.
Conservative government teacher is an oxymoron.
How can a conservative work in a socialist system that teaches socialism to children simply by existing? The simple act of attending teaches children that the government has the power to take money from their neighbor to pay for a service their parents want tuition-free? Well?...If it Ok for the government to use police threat to take money from their neighbor for schooling why not a thousand other socialist wants?
To compound the problem the children are taught that it is their **”right”** to have the government to threaten their neighbor with police action to collect money from their neighbor for tuition-free schooling.
Having politically “conservative” government teachers ( an oxymoron) in government schools also lulls other parents into thinking that their children will not be taught socialism in the schools because..Hey!...some of the teachers are “conservative”.
Well, doesn’t that figure! Why do I get the feeling that the government wants everyone over the age of 55 to jump off a bridge... except for our illustrious leaders, of course.
You are entitled to your opinion. Considering that the “government” schools are what the majority of Americans are using, I believe that all conservatives should be very involved in their schools.
Get on the local school board, and make changes. Force the local school boards to include those concepts you believe are important in the curriculmn.
I certainly never taught any socialism in my classes. In fact, the first few years, I taught elementary at a small country school. We said the pledge of allegiance, and said our prayers at snack time. No one reported us to the ACLU, so we got away with it.
Later I taught math, and there were plenty of ways that I was able to work public and personal fiscal responsibility into my lessons.
As to taxes for public schools, I have never begrudged them even though I haven’t had any children in school for almost 20 years. Besides everyone gets to vote on the county taxes for schools. I think federal funding for schools is unconstitutional, but that is unlikely to change at present.
Instead of scape-goating our institutions, maybe it is time to do what the socialists have been doing for the last century. Infiltrate, adn take back the schools, take back the news outlets, take back the entertainment industry that its spewing out unAmerican messages, and take back the political parties. Plenty of grassroots opportunity everywhere.
If your children are still in govt schools, pay attention to what is going on and get involved. Just my 2 cents. Take it or leave it.
Teachers are the greediest. For example, the relatively small state of New Jersey has 567 municipalities contained in 21 counties.
But NJ has 610 school districts and 900 high paid superintendents and assistant superintendents. Even in places with only one school.
There is no accountability, no oversight and no protection for taxpayers.
The NJSC ordered statewide taxpayers to fund poorer school districts........they receive billions in state funding.
In one poorer district, the Supt of Schools sucked up a $173,389 annual salary plus perks ....and wrote herself a $740,000 exit package upon retirement-—(which does not include her several state pensions of about $125,000 per year, bonuses and lifetime family health benefits).
Her BASE SEVERANCE PACKAGE: $556,290 (to be paid in five yearly installments so that she can evade taxes). She gamed the system, contriving that she had UNUSED SICK DAYS: $170,137 (paid out in three yearly installments to evade taxes) and supposedly had UNUSED VACATION DAYS totaling $14,449.
A superintendent’s contract also includes payments for travel, meals, lodging, life insurance, cars, free maintenance and auto insurance, payment for personal days, etc, etc, etc. Other Supt contracts include annuities and six-figure bonuses. All payouts structured to evade taxes.
One state report showed these school thieves routinely filed fraudulent state documents to hide stratospheric pay deals from taxpayers. This is prosecutable and incurs felony charges for first-degree tampering with public records, first-degree offering of a false instrument for filing, fourth-degree grand larceny, and first-degree falsifying of official records.
bttt
Ping me.
Great article.
When you think about it, there is no Constitutional authority for the very existence a vast number of Federal jobs, in fact, whole departments.
Eliminate those, and the savings would be tremendous.
Let those duties, where deemed necessary, fall upon the States and Local Governments to employ and fund at the discretion of the voters, local governments, and State Legislatures.
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