Bush limits bureaucrats' annual salary increase to 3.1% (civil servants whine)

Cnn.com ^ | Nov. 30th, 2002 | Cnn.com

[End The Hypocrisy]

"Federal civilian workers won't see the full pay raise they were promised with President Bush's announcement that he was cutting the planned salary hikes because of the war on terrorism. The workers were to have received an average increase of 18.6 percent, but will now get a 3.1 percent raise. "This is just another slap at federal employees," says Bobby L. Harnage Sr., president of the American Federation of Government Employees [labor union], representing 600,000 federal "workers". Says Harnage: "[t]he Bush administration says they want to recruit the best and the brightest, but they can't even keep the best and the brightest in those jobs now." Curiously enough, however, the Administration will soon let private companies compete for up to half of the 1.8 million federal jobs. Also, Bush sought and won broad powers to hire, fire and move civil service-protected workers in 22 agencies being merged into the new Homeland Security Department.

[End The Hypocrisy]

Can you believe the hypocrisy of that civil service labor union's director?  If the bureaucrats really wanted talented competitors to be able to join their ranks, they'd not require that it take AT LEAST half a year just to get to hire somebody new who could subsequently compete for their "jobs" [i.e. sinecures].  Meanwhile, most of the time new jobs are restricted to current civil servants who seek to escape supervisors eager to downsize them.  

[End The Hypocrisy]

Everybody in the real world's lucky to get any raise at all, assuming they even get to keep their jobs while we continue enduring the consequences of the bureaucrats' having jealously sabotaged private industry's potential progress over the years. And yet bureaucrats still have career tenure even as practically nobody else does?

[Always Right]

The average increase with the locality pay was gonna be over 18%! Thanks GW for keeping this reasonable.

[gitmo]

The average increase with the locality pay was gonna be over 18%! Thanks GW for keeping this reasonable.

Good grief! 18% AVERAGE salary increase! How long has this been going on? And I'm paying for it with my 3-4% increase minus tax increases!

[End The Hypocrisy]

>>>The average increase with the locality pay was gonna be over 18%! Thanks GW for keeping this reasonable. <<<


When bureaucrats' career tenure's finally revoked for the first time since they snuck the Pendleton [labor] Act in on us taxpaying voters a little over a century ago, that's when the civil service will start seeming "reasonable" to me.

[amigatec]

Well as a Government worker and a member of AFGE, let me say this. I see everyday where the Gov needs to cut expenses. We have grounds keepers but yet we contract out the grass cutting. We have to many bosses and not enough workers. I work for a VA Hospital and we have Doctors that get paid salary and do VERY little. I will be glad to see some of these people go.

[End The Hypocrisy]

Well said! Meanwhile, here's a great article by Linda Chavez (whom the media targeted to keep from becoming the new Secretary of Labor back in January of 2000)

Perpetual pursuit of government reforms

Al Gore tried it and failed. Ronald Reagan had some modest success when he attempted it. Even Jimmy Carter gave it a shot. Now President Bush is trying his hand at reforming the federal government. Let's hope he has more luck than his predecessors did. Mr. Gore tried to "reinvent government." Mr. Reagan's Grace Commission pledged to eliminate "waste, fraud and abuse." And Mr. Carter introduced "zero-based budgeting" for federal agencies to try to reduce the size of government. Despite their efforts, the size of the federal work force grew, but productivity didn't. Now Mr. Bush wants to cut the work force and improve productivity. Good luck.
The president's plan, announced during his weekly radio address, would create incentives for some current federal employees to take early retirement, out-source more jobs to contractors and base pay increases on performance rather than longevity, allowing managers to reward the best workers. If enacted -- and it will not be an easy task, especially with government employee unions fighting reform every step of the way -- the Bush plan could save a bundle.
The president complained that the federal government spends $45 billion a year on computers and technology, a huge sum, but "unlike private sector companies, this large investment has not cut the government's costs or improved people's lives in any way that we can measure."
It's no wonder why. The problem isn't lack of equipment, it's the people who are expected to use it. I've worked in government and headed two federal agencies during my career and still have many friends in government. I've encountered bright, dedicated federal workers over the years -- but unfortunately, I've encountered almost as many incompetent and just plain lazy federal employees as well.
Back in the days before voice mail, I had a secretary who refused to answer the phone. She'd let it ring 10 or 12 times, lift the receiver off the cradle and drop it back down again, disconnecting the caller. And this was in the congressional liaison office of the then Department of Health, Education and Welfare. This same woman filed a grievance against me when I asked that all members of Congress receive a response to their letters within two weeks.
When I was head of the Civil Rights Commission, I had a secretary who could barely speak English, much less read or write it well. Her job was to type the annual report to Congress on the commission's activities. When I discovered that much of the typed report was gibberish -- she didn't know what she was typing, they were just sequences of letters -- I offered to send her to classes to improve her English. That offer prompted a visit from the agency's solicitor, warning me that I shouldn't even suggest such a thing and certainly could not force her to take lessons.
Another woman in the agency -- a division manager -- would invite her assistant into her office every afternoon at 3 p.m. to play "Boggle," a board game involving dice the two would play noisily until quitting time. Now, federal employees can play computer games or surf the Internet to their heart's content all day long.
I estimate that about a third of the federal employees I worked with were hard-working, another third were competent but lacked initiative, and fully one third were unable or unwilling to do their jobs. The problem is, there's almost no way under the current system to adequately reward the first group or get rid of the last.
Mr. Bush's proposal attempts to deal with this problem, but it doesn't go nearly far enough. If we want accountability from federal employees, we've got to overhaul the entire system. It means getting rid of job protection for federal employees.
If an employee doesn't perform, there's no reason to keep him. If a program is reduced or eliminated, the staff should be cut accordingly, not just reshuffled within the agency.
If the government could hire and fire like much of the private sector does, agencies could do with fewer employees -- and afford to compensate the best ones commensurate with their talent. But don't count on it happening anytime soon.
Linda Chavez is a nationally syndicated columnist

Article formerly maintained at: http://www.washingtontimes.com/commentary/20010830-99647884.htm

[End The Hypocrisy]

>>>Well as a Government worker and a member of AFGE, let me say this. I see everyday where the Gov needs to cut expenses. We have grounds keepers but yet we contract out the grass cutting. We have to many bosses and not enough workers. I work for a VA Hospital and we have Doctors that get paid salary and do VERY little. I will be glad to see some of these people go.<<<


You won't be the ONLY one! :-) For information about President Bush's progress in his endeavor to finally revoke such parasitic louts' career tenure, one can visit:

http://www.spaceprojects.com/bureaucrats

[End The Hypocrisy]

Isn't it revealing how bureaucrats frequently boast that they could make so much more in the private sector, but then whenever they're shown the doorway to the private sector they dig in their heels and rant about how it's their supposed patriotic duty to remain on the federal trough for the good of our country?

[princess leah]

"with government employee unions fighting every reform" WHO IS THE REAL ENEMY of AMERICA? I say it's the unions!

[End The Hypocrisy]

At least 40% of union members traditionally vote for REPUBLICAN House members. But their leaders have donated 92% of their dues money to Democrat politicians. Campaign finance reform will help us with such an antidemocratic soft money abuse.

[gitmo]

I have always been very reluctant to hire people coming out of government agencies.

[copycat]

Why should W. worry about the whining of civil serice workers? It's not like he was gonna get their vote anyway...

[RGSpincich]

"This is just another slap at federal employees," Bobby L. Harnage Sr., president of the American Federation of Government Employees, which represents 600,000 federal workers, told the Associated Press. The Bush administration says "they want to recruit the best and the brightest, but they can't even keep the best and the brightest in those jobs now."

Your sorry ass union negotiated the contract that allowes such action. Ask the extinct FAA union negotiators how it feels.

[Republic of Texas]

Drudge is calling this a "cut". Typical stupid media B.S.

[buffyt]

My husband has been a chemical engineer with Dow Chem for almost 30 years and they already announced No Raises or Bonuses next year. We will be grateful if he still has a job. We have three college kids.

[End The Hypocrisy]

>>>Drudge is calling this a "cut". Typical stupid media B.S.<<<


1) Drudge isn't conservative like us? I admit to seldom reading his stuff.

2) Only in the government is the lack of an increase considered a "cut".

3) The media depends upon bureaucrats for news links and favorable recommendations to government contractors that could sponsor the media. Talk about a journalistic conflict of interest...

[gitmo]

Competition is scary.

[End The Hypocrisy]

>>>My husband has been a chemical engineer with Dow Chem for almost 30 years and they already announced No Raises or Bonuses next year. We will be grateful if he still has a job. We have three college kids.<<<


Ah but unlike the bureaucrats, your husband hasn't been doing patriotically wonderful things for our country that warrant exorbitant payraises (at taxpayers' expense). Gotta love those civil servants, huh? Meanwhile, our national debt just reached an all-time high of $6.3 trillion dollars:

http://www.publicdebt.treas.gov/opd/opdpenny.htm

Like the bureaucrats care, though? We should give them a long overdue incentive to...

[End The Hypocrisy]

>>>Competition is scary.<<<


For the uncompetitive, sure...