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Moderator cut: See belowThe various state, federal, municipal jobs have the public as the their "boss", so, are you, as the sitting boss, going to deny your employees a decent life into the future beyond their working years? Why is it that some of the American populace becomes so obsessed with what they see as a unfair situation in the various PERS systems?? We as citizens should openly and wholeheartedly advocate for "our" employees, and then follow through with our demands on the rest of the employer class to do the same.......
Tune into Moderator cut: see belowradio sometime and you'll see where all this silly turmoil is created. Instead of advocating for laws that make employers responsible for the contribution to a REAL retirement system Moderator cut: see below They also advocate for the totality of Social Security to be turned over to their masters on Wall Street for "our benefit", just as they so wisely invested during the pre meltdown days that darkened America's days in 2008. I wish people would do a little studying of the issues before wanting a "debate" that is simply "bait"..................
Last edited by Oldhag1; 07-01-2014 at 10:20 AM..
Reason: Unless a thread is specifically about politics bringing up political parties or identifiers is off topic.
I don't know what state employs you as an auditor, but the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics claims that state and municipal workers on average make far more in total compensation than private sectors employees make.
"The United States Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) announced on March 12th that the total cost of employing a state or local government worker is 45% more than an equivalent worker in the private sector."
I'm not an analyst of this topic in any way, shape or form. But the statistics that you are using to bolster your argument are not comparing apples to apples. There are so many differences between the federal workforce and the private sector. You are just comparing the salaries and benefits. However, you neglect to provide obvious differences that factor into why federal workers as a whole earn more than the private sector.
This study, explains some of the differences between the two job sectors. As you'll notice, 33% of federal workers are employed in professional occupations compared to just 18% in the private sector. Professional occupations such as engineers, scientists and IT security specialists require a certain amount of education and skill. Also, most federal positions are located in the northeast which in terms of locale would command a higher rate of pay and benefits.
Another difference you'll notice is that 26% of all private sector jobs are in the traditionally low paying retail sales, production and construction industries vs. 7% of the federal employees working in those industries. The numbers back up the fact that federal employees are statistically more educated [51% compared to 31% have earned at least a bachelor's degree] than those holding jobs in the private sector. Given these numbers, it is only natural that federal employees on average would command more compensation than those who work in the private sector.
Statistically speaking in terms of total compensation, the higher the education level of the employees, the smaller the disparity is between the two groups. In the private sector, most employees without a college degree do not receive the type of compensation and benefits they would if they were employed by the government. However the more you factor in education, the smaller the gap actually becomes.
I'm not going to try to convince anyone whether or not federal employees should have their pensions funded (even indirectly) through taxpayers who do not enjoy the same benefits. But using the disparity in pay between government and private sector employees as a basis to for this argument isn't really fair. It's a fact of life that there are employers who are willing to pay more for employees with the skills they deem important. Just because the U.S. government happens to be the employer in this case does not all of the sudden make this wrong.
Should tax paying citizens who do not have a pension plan going for them be required to fund the pensions of others?
Few private sector employees have a pension plan in this day and age. However, most public sector employees (municipal, state and Federal) have pension plans that are funded in whole or in part from taxes imposed on all people in their respective tax base.
In my mind, it doesn't make any sense whatsoever to require people who don't have a pension to fund the pensions of people in the public sector. If it were up to me, I would provide for a tax credit for people without a pension plan or, better yet, pass a law that required all public sector employees to fund their own pensions.
What makes sense to you?
Its a good point
But of course the reason they get money and benefits is not bek they are government
Its bek they have unions
You hate unions
How is that working out
???
Simple answer: If you want a pension, get a public employee job. There isn't a single private sector job, which doesn't have a public sector counterpart.
I agree. I'm sick of hearing people gripe about public pensions, especially private sector employees who unfortunately lost theirs. If they wanted a public pension, they could have had a public service job.
I agree. I'm sick of hearing people gripe about public pensions, especially private sector employees who unfortunately lost theirs. If they wanted a public pension, they could have had a public service job.
Agreed.
I wonder if those statistics also take into consideration that 1.4 million federal employees are our military?
That would be the easiest place to start if someone really wants a government pension.
But then, most want nothing to do with any organization that requires them to follow orders without question, put themselves in harms way, spend months or years separated from their families and do the myriad other things required to be successful in that environment.
I'd say - and I'm just guessing here - that if you threw out the data for the federal level jobs, you'd see that state and local salaries are much lower than their private counterparts, which then justifies the better benefits package. OTOH, we are all aware of the bloated bureaucracies at the federal level and I'm pretty sure they are skewing the data the OP presented.
I wonder if that data includes the Congress, Cabinet, etc. If so, there's where we'd all agree that funding their pensions isn't fair.
Here, private firefighters and security earn far less than local and state counter parts.
The summer fire season fire fire crews working along side their government counterparts get little more than minimum wage for the most part.
Some retired law enforcement go to work for private companies... compensation is much less unless they choose to work overseas in a war zone.
Its a good point
But of course the reason they get money and benefits is not bek they are government
Its bek they have unions
You hate unions
How is that working out
???
Not all public sector employees are in a union. About 40% of the staff where I work is not represented. The last time I was in a union was more than 35 years ago when I worked for a large retailer.
There should never be a "conventional" pension plan, with promised payments, for public sector workers. That places the responsibility for paying for compensation of these employees on future generations of taxpayers, who never received any services from those employees. In addition, it makes it impossible for any responsible municipality to accurately predict future payouts (due to sliding costs) and also makes elected officials far too willing to support public employee union demands (in return for campaign donations). Elected officials also have a responsibility to represent the taxpayer-one they often forget.
I would support 401K plans for public sector employees, paid for as they worked. That puts the burden on the people currently receiving services from them, and also allows them to keep their retirement should they leave the public sector. It also better shows the true cost of public sector employees to the taxpayers, rather than hiding that cost as a burden to future generations.
There should never be a "conventional" pension plan, with promised payments, for public sector workers. That places the responsibility for paying for compensation of these employees on future generations of taxpayers, who never received any services from those employees. In addition, it makes it impossible for any responsible municipality to accurately predict future payouts (due to sliding costs) and also makes elected officials far too willing to support public employee union demands (in return for campaign donations). Elected officials also have a responsibility to represent the taxpayer-one they often forget.
I would support 401K plans for public sector employees, paid for as they worked. That puts the burden on the people currently receiving services from them, and also allows them to keep their retirement should they leave the public sector. It also better shows the true cost of public sector employees to the taxpayers, rather than hiding that cost as a burden to future generations.
I agree.
We all know that it can take years for savings to be realized from changes to pension plans. Yet here in NY, the unions dragged their feet for 10 years, railing against the creation of a new tier (Tier 5)--for new employees, BTW, which was to bring reasonable changes such as longer service requirement and increased employee contributions. Guess what? It was ultimately established anyway, but only after a decade of savings was lost. And oh, BTW again, with another tier (Tier 6) following a couple of years later.
IMO, we need to chuck the pensions altogether for new employees, and go with the defined contribution plan for public sector employees. Had this been introduced in the 80s, when they began to come into prominence, states would already be seeing savings, and those that have discontinued COLAS or reduced benefits wouldn't have had to do so.
Most public employees, but not all, fund at least 50 percent of their pension. So the taxpayers are not footing the entire bill. And as Sacite stated, public employees generally make less in salary than their private sector counterparts so the benefits are what entices many to work in government.
Yep. I worked 10 years for a govt entity that had a pension fund. It was self-funded, ie came out of our own paychecks. Plus, we had no option to opt out; it was a mandatory contribution. In addition, there was no 'company-match' 401k benefit, at all. Govt benefits aren't all they are cracked up to be.
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