Posted on 01/23/2017 1:34:32 PM PST by mdittmar
WASHINGTON – Donald Trump is backtracking on campaign pledges to create American jobs and cut wasteful government spending by issuing an executive order to freeze federal employee hiring across the country, which will result in more work being outsourced to more expensive contractors, the American Federation of Government Employees said today.
“President Trump’s action will disrupt government programs and services that benefit everyone and actually increase taxpayer costs by forcing agencies to hire more expensive contractors to do work that civilian government employees are already doing for far less,” AFGE National President J. David Cox Sr. said.
More than 85 percent of federal employees live and work outside the nation’s capital, so a hiring freeze targeting civilian workers will be felt in cities and towns across the country.
The number of federal employees has been frozen at about 2 million for the past 50 years, since John F. Kennedy was president. Meanwhile, the number of contractors employed by the government has grown to at least twice the number of full-time federal employees, and trillions of dollars have been wasted on service contracts and mismanaged weapons systems.
“Numerous studies have shown that contractors are two to three times more costly than each federal employee they replace,” Cox said. “President Trump’s federal hiring freeze will result in more government waste as agencies are forced to hire high-priced contractors to do the work that federal employees can and should be doing.”
President Trump’s executive order excludes employees working on national security and defense issues, which accounts for roughly two-thirds of the current federal workforce. That means the hiring freeze will disproportionately affect domestic agencies and programs, many of which have already endured severe budget cuts this decade.
“This hiring freeze will mean longer lines at Social Security offices, fewer workplace safety inspections, less oversight of environmental polluters, and greater risk to our nation’s food supply and clean water systems,” Cox said.
“All Americans should be outraged that President Trump is gutting federal programs and funneling their taxpayer dollars into the hands of less-regulated private companies who answer to their corporate shareholders and not the American people,” Cox said.
Says the putrid federal government workers union that has demanded a far more generous pay scale for its members than the taxpayers get in private industry. This results in having the five richest county clustered around D.C.
This should be ended immediately, with mass firings a necessity.
I love seeing the globalist minions squealing.
Of course, their pain is country’s gain. Bureaucrats are the boots on the ground enforcing government tyranny.
These people have been bought for 30 pieces of silver and can never be convinced in supporting freedom. They are even more far gone the snowflakes and welfare cases.
The important part is that the Democrat party will get less funding/contributions from the unions.
AFGE (AFL-CIO) is in bed with the dems, and has been since forever. They do not care about their dues paying members, the federal government or the taxpayer.
They are leaches than need to be trimmed down to size.
Open weeping by government bow wows...
These people are delusional.
Contracts are cheaper if you don’t let government employees write them.
And while it might be true that contractor rates are higher than the base employee rate, contractors don't get benefits, and most especially don't get federal pensions. Total cost is likely much lower.
LOL! Anyone who knows anything about economics knows that the creation of a public employee position comes at the expense of many fewer jobs created in the private sector. What an idiot.
Who give a rip what they said?
We're taking this nation back a-holes.
“Numerous studies have shown that contractors are two to three times more costly than each federal employee they replace,...”
such as?
Fencing will hurt the chickens said the fox.
Of course the AFGE is going to cry over the hiring freeze. These unions line the pockets of the union hierarchy and the pockets of the politicians at the expense of the workers. Many are Leftist Marxist sympathizers.
Why are federal employees unionized in the first place? What part of the constitution allows for this unionization of government workers?
Why should the federal government answer to union workers (which is a private entity) over the tax payer?
The most absurd question of all is this: On what basis does the union accuse the head of the executive branch of government who happens to be a successful billionaire business man, of not knowing what he’s doing?
They sure had a cushy pork barrel working for them at our expense, didn’t they?
At the ultra large world wide company I worked for, when a hiring freeze was in place, it came along with a REDUCTION in contractor workforce, not an increase.
Does anyone remember this Union ever saying anything about the wasteful spending on federal contractors before?
I like your questions and share the consternation of having this situation.
End it.
Yes they did. Time to end it.
Well, if the freeze will cost more money it’s clear that firing them is in order.
I’m a federal worker and I disagree with his statement. Plus, and something this gentleman forgets to mention, federal hiring at military bases is unaffected.
As if unions ever answered to the American people.
non-partisan much...?
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