Free Republic

In 10 minutes the teleprompter in chief will announce that he is about to freeze government salaries for two years. Of course, government workers thank him, as this means federal salaries which have exploded in the past 5 years will be stuck at all time highs for at least two years, even as nominal salaries for everyone else (except FIRE workers of course) continue to decline. As we suggested a few days ago, in order to promote some vaguely credible idea of austerity, instead of freezing salaries, Obama needs to be cutting. Why? One look at the chart below explains...

We've often heard that civil servants forgo higher private-sector salaries in order to serve the nation selflessly. Many federal bureaucrats are indeed hardworking, but new statistics show that they are anything but underpaid. The Bureau of Economic Analysis released data this month showing that the average compensation for the 1.8 million federal civilian workers in 2005 was $106,579 -- exactly twice the average compensation paid in the U.S. private sector: $53,289. If you consider wages without benefits, the average federal civilian worker earned $71,114, 62 percent more than the average private-sector worker, who made $43,917. The high level of federal...