Posted on 08/11/2012 9:11:03 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
The spending plan proposed by Rep. Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin, Mitt Romney’s pick as the Republican vice presidential candidate, has drawn strong opposition from federal employees.
Under the proposed House Republican budget, which Ryan sponsored as chairman of the Budget Committee, savings from the federal workforce would total $368 billion over 10 years. The two-year freeze on basic federal pay rates, scheduled to expire at the end of this year, would be extended through 2015 for a total of five years.
“The Path to Prosperity,” as the budget plan is named, also calls on federal workers to make an unspecified “more equitable contribution to their retirement plans,” which means higher costs to employees. Additionally, the federal workforce would be cut, through attrition over three years, by 10 percent, which equals more than 200,000 positions.
Because the Departments of Defense, Veterans Affairs, Justice and Homeland Security have so many employees, the majority of the eliminated positions would come from these agencies, all of which are related to national security.
The budget document says its plans “reflect the growing frustration of workers across the country at the privileged rules enjoyed by government employees.”
Ryan’s budget justifies the employee-related cuts, saying “it is no coincidence that private sector employment continues to grow only sluggishly while the government expands: To pay for the public sector’s growth, Washington must immediately tax the private sector or else borrow and impose taxes later to pay down the debt.”
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
I agree with your last sentence. And the students are dumber than ever in spite of more and more money being spent.
Fact is it's fairly difficult to get a federal government job, and the average age of entry is 35 ~ not 18 like at McDonalds.
Once you get the job it's very likely you won't get your choice of where you will be employed. That makes hanging onto those jobs somewhat difficult particularly if you wanted your kids in a certain school, or you liked to keep palling around with your own ethnic group in a certain part of the country.
Regarding the military, I was in the Infantry. That's nothing at all like working in an office. Actually, working in an office is not at all like working in the post office ~ and I didn't do that either. In a bad year i'd travel close to 1/4 million miles, and in a good year I'd avoid travel completely. Bet you think of travel as a way to have a good time. I think of it as a way to get bleeding sinuses and a sore bottom. Then there are the hours. Post offices operate 24 hours a day. It was possible to have a project under way that would require your attendance all of them ~ and for in-determinant periods. In an older time they had what management called POMSIP. Guys from headquarters would come out and reorganize a major post office to work the way it was supposed to do. They'd be on travel anywhere from 3 months to 6 months.
Up until the 1980s you got one 5 minute phone call per day.
Most of the survey work was done standing up. So was the field observation work. Even discussion with floor supervisors was done standing up.
Most of my friends and associates who'd ever worked as floor supervisors and then done field survey work or audits in later years have artificial knees, hips or ankles.
And most of them were military veterans.
Now, about "useless people" ~ that'd be the guy who wants to be a top boss and he's a high-school graduate and he dropped out of his one semester in college. I'd encourage him or her to try county government. Get a job as a cop. Eat dough-nuts.
The objective was always to put the right people in the right jobs, and right size the agency for its mission.
She told me that they always seemed to end up putting the same people, or people like them, back in what amounted to the same jobs.
It was an hopelessly endless task.
So, leaving that mess she went to Postal Headquarters, developed a little something called Stamps By Mail, and eliminated the need for anyone to ever have to go to a post office again ~ and for a good 25 or 30 million people in this country, that's no joke at all.
That saved TENS OF MILLIONS OF DOLLARS ~ just one project. It also fit well within existing work parameters so no one had to learn anything new.
FAA couldn't use her. USPS found she was worth her weight in gold.
A fellow who had a desk about 10 feet from my own finally figured out how USPS could allow the use of credit cards ~ not at easy job since they are not allowed by law to give discounts for stamps and that rebate to the credit card companies amounted to a rebate ~ and would therefore make the whole process of using credit cards unlawful.
Made your life easier. Teams of lawyers and CPAs had been broken on the wheel of life by that task ~ and they'd failed. He succeeded. Typical of postal management his bosses took it as a matter of course that he could do wonders ~ so it was like 'well, that's nice, but what are you going to do this year'.
One thing USPS has never figured out is how to get decent executive talent ~ on the other hand all of your more successful projects require thousands of hours in the field studying existing operations to see where new stuff can fit in without additional cost or training, and without anyone in the otherwise naive public noticing it!
Maybe you don't know about the Washington Monument Defense. That's what agencies do when somebody wants to do a whack job on agencies per se ~ they say "Hey, we'll have to close the Washington Monument and the National Pars". As usual Congress backs off.
The POST used that defense ~ imagining Conservatives could be concerned about military systems analysts being the first ones fired in an Obama expense cutting exercise.
I bet even they thought it was funny.
That you didn't get it is highly disturbing.
There are probably some military or government retirees working for grocery stores, rental car agencies, hotels and so forth.
Let me tell you something, government retirement isn't all it's cracked up to be so many retirees need supplemental income and they go into later careers doing stuff.
There are probably some military or government retirees working for grocery stores, rental car agencies, hotels and so forth.
Let me tell you something, government retirement isn't all it's cracked up to be so many retirees need supplemental income and they go into later careers doing stuff.
Read more closely in the future.
As regards this comment you made to Jim from CTown: “Not to rub this in but you haven’t informed yourself enough on these matters to make comments.” Your comment covers about 90 percent of the typical Freeper comments on federal employment. Generally, they, unlike you, know nothing about the subject but that doesn’t stop them. Hell, their feelings govern everything.
I searched the entire article, and didn't see the word "military" or "weapons". What article were you reading?
In fact, the article says Ryan didn't call for ANYBODY to be fired. That's what "attrition" means -- they simply don't hire new people when the current workers retire or quit.
How about we eliminate the Post Office entirely? Also HUD, Education, Energy...
I’m afraid that you are misinformed, muawiyah. Elimination of Federal spending on healthcare and welfare alone would more than eliminate the deficit.
That's excellent!
As for selling public lands, even a 10% reduction in Federal Landholdings and a moratorium on declaring National Monuments and Wilderness Area/Wildlands designations would be a good start.
Eliminating federal government retirees by murdering them in their beds would do little to even bother the deficit ~
I think he's totally aware of this of course. But what he does is take part of the FERS annuity payment ~ currently funded directly out of agency operating budgets ~ and shifts that to AFTER TAX INCOME paid by the federal employees.
He then gives the employees a payraise enough to offset the loss of income.
So, three things here ~ (1) The agencies continue to be budgeted for the annuity payment ~ so that doesn't reduce government spending, (2) The annuity payment continues to be paid at the existing level without change so there's no upstream or downstream change in the final FERS benefit to eventual retirees, and (3) Federal employees get a raise taxed at their highest possible rate and that goes back into the Treasury as new revenue.
You folks walk away satisfied saying "Well that'll show those evil federal workers".
Ryan laughs at you!
That, BTW, is not a joke ~ what will it do?
Explain in exquisite detail.
Think about it ~ where does DOD get its money? Is it from defeated enemies or from the citizens of the United States.
I think it's time for some serious revisions to the DOD revenue stream ~ time for some tribute!
I guess you didn’t see the report. The PO has lost TWELVE BILLION, this fiscal year to date:
Shut it down and sell off the bits.
I did ~ right at "Because the Departments of Defense, Veterans Affairs, Justice and Homeland Security have so many employees, the majority of the eliminated positions would come from these agencies, all of which are related to national security."
And which jobs first? Well, if you've read in any detail about the proposals, you know the DOD always has this choice between "tooth" or "tail". He and others have already talked about protecting salaries paid to soldiers ~ that's the "tooth", so that means "high income civilian jobs" go first, and that's part of "tail".
Ryan is laughing at you ~ constantly and chronically. He may well be Eagelton Reprise.
Bwahahahahahahahahahaa!
The only one here talking about killing Federal workers is YOU, and it’s a bit creepy.
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