Government Workers Don't Want to Make Sacrifices
Top Federal Union Boss: “You’re Mentally Retarded” If You Want to Cut Government Spending
February 10, 2011SHTFPlan - With over $200 trillion in committed liabilities, the United States is very quickly nearing utter disaster. With most Americans calling for governments on the federal, state and local levels to cut spending, there’s one organization that will have none of it -- the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE).
According to AFGE President John Gage, you need professional help if you think spending cuts are the answer:
"When people say, well, we just have to pay less in wages, whether it’s private sector or public sector, I think they’re mentally retarded to say something like that."
John Gage and the AFGE, which is the largest federal union in the U.S.A., represent some 600,000 federal and D.C. government employees who have been living off the taxpayer teat for decades. We’re at the point now where there will be forced austerity measures -- the government has no choice.
The fact of the matter is that one must be mentally challenged, especially when it comes to basic arithmetic, to believe that wages can be increased and public sector employee pensions can be maintained at current levels while retaining purchasing value. It is simply not possible.
Either the spending austerity is going to come in the form of voluntary wage cuts and pension concessions, or both will be wiped out by a steadily depreciating U.S. dollar -- the likely outcome may very well be both.
The AFGE’s membership has no clue what’s about to hit them, because they’re simply not paying attention to the warning signs and remain focused on the old paradigm, where excessive government largess was distributed within bureaucracies built on a culture of mediocrity and corruption. They and many others will Wake Up to the Danger After It Has Already Happened.
We’ve now run out of money – real money that is. Sure, we can continue to print dollars and we probably will, but we all know the end result of that misguided solution.
As we pointed out in June of 2010, we can expect 2 Million Layoffs By State and Local Governments before this is all said and done, and that’s if government employees are lucky -- it’ll likely be much more. We’re already seeing massive cuts in the government workforce, especially on the local levels in essential emergency responder personnel. Just recently, the city of Houston, TX began forced furloughs for teachers in the Houston ISD. These are not isolated incidents. It’s national, and it will continue.
Today, these protesters are walking the picket line in the hopes the government, acting in their interests and through the use of force, will seize more money from an already dwindling tax base. But soon, these same people will be rioting in the streets when they can no longer afford food and critical medical services.
Federal Workers Rally Against Potential Cuts in Workforce, Wages and Benefits
Bureaucrats don't want to make sacrifices like the private sector; instead, they want to cut social programs benefiting the people, cut Social Security, and raise taxes on the 'rich.'February 8, 2011
govexec.com - Nearly 1,000 American Federation of Government Employees members marched on the Capitol on Tuesday, urging Congress not to target the federal workforce in efforts to reduce government spending.
AFGE members from all 50 states delivered petitions to their senators, arguing that freezing federal salaries, cutting benefits and reducing the government workforce were not good ways to balance the federal budget. The petitions stated the budget deficit is not the result of issues with federal compensation.
"It's not like we're retiring rich," said Bob Snelson, who works for the Bureau of Prisons at a super-maximum security facility in Colorado Springs, Colo., and is chief steward of AFGE Local 1322.Snelson, a 25-year veteran of the government, said an extended pay freeze would affect him "quite a bit," especially with the rising costs of health insurance. The average amount that federal employees pay for health care coverage is increasing 7.2 percent this year [Editor's Note: Bureaucrats have no idea what it's like working in the real world of private business; it's worth reading the comments to this article].
Other attendees agreed moves such as extending the current two-year salary freeze to five years, as Republicans proposed in January, would cause real hardship for public employees, especially those at the bottom of the federal pay scale.
"They don't make a lot of money as it is," said Robena Reid, a member of AFGE Local 3313 and an economist at the Transportation Department.Government employees are being asked to "foot the bill for the nation's overspending and undertaxing," Snelson said.
The rally comes a week before President Obama will deliver to Congress his fiscal 2012 budget request, which is expected to reveal more details about potential changes to the federal workforce.
Since President Obama announced a two-year federal pay freeze in late November 2010, lawmakers have been discussing additional options for reducing the deficit through cuts in government benefits and jobs. In early December 2010, the president's fiscal commission proposed reducing the federal workforce by 10 percent, adjusting health and retirement benefits, and extending the pay freeze for another year. And in their January proposal, GOP lawmakers called for a 15 percent reduction in the federal workforce along with the three-year extension of the pay freeze.
Obama has not said whether he intends to act on those proposals, but during his State of the Union speech last month, he announced a five-year freeze on discretionary nonsecurity spending and a major reorganization of the federal government.
Some rally attendees said cuts targeted at government employees would result in diminished or inadequate federal services. LaVerne English, a member of AFGE Local 2028 in Pittsburgh, said shrinking the federal workforce would lead to staffing shortages at the Veterans Affairs Department facility where she works. For English, the outcome is obvious.
"If you don't have enough nurses or nurse practitioners," she said, "the veterans don't get good care."AFGE President John Gage said in an interview during the march that the public has misconceptions about what government employees do.
Federal employees are "[staffing] your VA hospitals, inspecting mines, watching the border [and] manning our prisons," he said. "It's time we really stand up and defend ourselves and defend the work we do."Gage and other attendees expressed concern over the way politicians and the media have portrayed civil servants during the recent debate over the size and role of the federal government.
"It's coming from all angles for federal employees," he said. "We're upset with the president for reinforcing these terrible myths that our people are overpaid [and] that [we have] a bloated government, when really many of our agencies are short-staffed."Some of the rally attendees went further, expressing frustration over the government's bailout of the financial sector and the recent extension of the George W. Bush administration tax cuts.
"They had so much money to bail out the banks, and we're being asked to accept less," Reid said.From Federal Employees Salary Database for 2009:
"I think [Congress] should go to Wall Street" to make cuts, said Johnnie Gatling, a social worker at the Baltimore VA Medical Center and a member of AFGE District 4. "They're millionaires."
| REID, ROBENA G | FEDERAL TRANSIT ADMINISTRATION | District of Columbia | District of Columbia | WASHINGTON | ECONOMIST | GS 13 | $98,518 | $0 |
| GATLING, JOHNNIE M | VETERANS HEALTH ADMINISTRATION | Maryland | Cecil County | PERRY POINT | SOCIAL WORK | GS 11 | $78,089 | $0 |
The federal government does not create a traditional sellable product and thus produces no revenue outside of what it collects from taxpayers. As of 2008, the average federal salary was $79,197, compared with $49,935 for the average private sector employee. In other words, the average federal bureaucrat makes almost twice as much as the average working taxpayer. Add the value of benefits like health care and pensions, and the gap grows even bigger. The average federal employee’s benefits add $40,785 to his annual total compensation, whereas the average working taxpayer’s benefits increase his total compensation by only $9,974. In other words, federal workers are paid on average salaries that are twice as generous as those in the private sector, and they receive benefits that are four times greater. [Brandon Greife, The Public Sector Weight Around Taxpayers’ Necks, RedStates.com, May 4, 2010]
The Federal Pay Freeze That Isn’t Much of One
December 3, 2010FOXBusiness - “Steal their thunder.”
"Borrow a page out of former President Bill Clinton’s playbook.”
That seemed to be behind President Barack Obama’s recent proposal to freeze federal pay, a smaller government proposal that preempts the Republicans.
Trouble is, President Obama’s federal pay freeze really isn’t a pay freeze.
About two-thirds of the 2.2 million federal workers affected will get pay increases each year anyway. Why?
Because the freeze only applies to cost-of-living increases for 2011 and 2012 — tiny anyway, at about 1.4%, given low core inflation (not counting food and energy prices).
Most federal employees will still receive automatic seniority-based pay increases, called “step-pay” increases, for satisfactory job performance (most every federal worker gets a passing grade).
Federal workers will also continue to get promotions in grade, overtime pay, as well as bonuses.
So a new GS-15 would have started this year at about $124,000. After a year on the job, that government worker’s step-pay increase would lift that salary to about $128,000, even with the President’s pay freeze. And that’s before bonuses and overtime pay.
The President’s fiscal 2011 budget had envisioned a 1.4% pay increase. His plan to freeze federal pay by getting rid of the COLA adjustment for two years would save an estimated $28 billion over five years.
But even the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) says the President’s pay freeze is largely symbolic.
“Many federal workers would still get pay raises the next two years,” AFGE Legislative and Political Director Beth Moten wrote in a Dec. 2 letter to House and Senate lawmakers.
Moten tartly added: “Denying pay increases to federal workers will have no measurable impact on the deficit, won’t spur economic growth or job creation and won’t free up resources to refurbish the nation’s public infrastructure.”Also, the President’s federal pay freeze would not affect members of Congress or their staffs. Last May, Congress voted to freeze its own pay for 2011. Base pay for House and Senate lawmakers is $174,000, though leaders earn a higher salary. The cost-of-living increase would have given lawmakers an estimated $1,600 average raise in 2011.
Moten noted: “It will do nothing but create operational and morale problems,” plus “impoverish the already modestly-paid federal work force.”
The President’s pay freeze also exempts military troops, but it does affect Defense Department employees.
Obama had hoped to turn the tables on the Republicans, similar to how Clinton triangulated with welfare reform in 1996 after the GOP swept Congress in 1994. Obama’s federal pay freeze won praise and raised comparisons to President Ronald Reagan, who froze pay in 1986, and even with Clinton, who also tried to freeze federal pay in 1994.
But the President’s attempt at a limited federal pay freeze may not even fly in Congress. The President “cannot freeze federal pay unilaterally,” even for just his proposed cap on COLA pay hikes, notes the Heritage Foundation. It would also take an act of Congress to stop federal step- pay increases and bonuses, among other things.
The President needs Congress to act on his proposal, which he wants to take effect January 1. Doubtful that would happen in the very crowded lame duck session.
Also, the President’s pay freeze does not affect the reason why federal compensation is higher than the private sector -- very rich federal benefits, like government pensions federal workers can start drawing down on as early as age 56. Those pensions are typically based on the highest three years of salary, versus five at private companies.
“Those federal benefits are a big reason why federal worker compensation is so out of whack with private sector reality,” the Heritage Foundation says.The average federal employee gets compensation (wages and benefits) that is about 30% to 40% greater than what a comparable private sector worker gets, says James Sherk, a labor economist with the Heritage Foundation.
“Worse, the current federal pay system does little to reward performance,” Sherk says. “As a result, the federal government is both overpaying underperforming workers and underpaying the most skilled federal employees.”Sherk says Congress should replace the federal general pay schedule with “pay-for-performance systems tied to market compensation.” He also says federal benefits should be brought in line with the private sector, and that the federal retirement age should be raised from 56 to the Social Security retirement age.
That age is also much lower than the age of 62 that taxpayers must reach to get Social Security benefits — proposals to cut the deficit would raise that age to 67 in 2027).
Sherk says his federal pay reforms would save taxpayers $47 billion every year, versus the president’s $28 billion over five years.
The National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform, which President Obama created, also has a pay freeze proposal that goes beyond the President’s plan. The commission proposes a three-year pay freeze on federal workers and Defense Department civilians that would freeze step-pay increases and bonuses, saving more than $60 billion in three years.
How does the average salary for civilian federal employees stack up against the private worker?
Factcheck.org says it was $81,258 in 2009 — about 61% higher than the $50,462 paid to the average private sector worker, based on statistics from the Bureau of Economic Analysis.
Factcheck.org also notes reports that say that the federal government paid $41,791 in benefits for every federal civilian worker — far more than the $10,589 spent on benefits for the average private-sector worker.
But these figures are inflated, the watchdog group says. It notes that “these numbers were arrived at by dividing full-time equivalent employees for private industries and federal government by their total compensation or their total wage and salary. But the statistics on federal employees exclude the military as well as postal workers.”
Also, Factcheck.org points out that the BEA says that total compensation for federal workers could be overstated as well, as it includes an unknown amount for retirees’ health and life insurance benefits. Meaning, it includes billions of dollars that Congress appropriates each year to pay "unfunded liabilities" for retirees and current workers covered by the old Civil Service Retirement System before it was replaced for newly hired workers starting Jan. 1, 1987.
Federal Pay Freeze Plan Won't Stop Raises
It is disgusting that our government should give COLA raises to government employees and ignore the needs of Social Security recipients who paid for their benefits. Senior citizens have made their contributions to making this country great and now are being thrown to the dogs by the generation they raised. Shame! Shame! Shame! - David Browning, Obama “Pay Freeze”: 1.1 Million Federal Employees to Receive $2.5 Billion in Raises, MyGovCost.org, December 6, 2010December 6, 2010
Federal Times - President Obama spoke of the need for sacrifice last week when he announced a two-year pay freeze for federal employees.
But feds won't be too terribly deprived in 2011 and 2012. Despite the freeze, some 1.1 million employees will receive more than $2.5 billion in raises during that period.
Congress is expected to approve Obama's proposal, which cancels only cost-of-living adjustments for two years. Regularly scheduled step increases for the 1.4 million General Schedule employees — who make up two-thirds of the civilian work force — will continue. The size of those increases ranges from 2.6 percent to 3.3 percent and by law kick in every one, two or three years, depending on an employee's time in grade.
John Gage, national president of the American Federation of Government Employees, called Obama's plan "wrongheaded" and driven by politics. But he said the news that step increases will not be affected takes some of the sting out of the decision.
"They're doing this as a symbol, but it's the wrong type of symbol to take it out on working people making basic wages," Gage said.
But Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, called the retention of step increases a hole in Obama's plan. He also said the administration should freeze hiring and reduce the federal payroll from $447 billion to $400 billion.
"Somehow, someway I think this country can survive on just a $400 billion payroll," Chaffetz said.
He is the ranking Republican on the House Oversight and Government Reform subcommittee on the federal work force, and could become chairman when Republicans take control of the House next year.
In addition to General Schedule employees receiving step increases, some of the government's roughly 187,000 wage-grade employees also will receive step increases.
And many employees will receive promotions, which also come with salary increases, Jeffrey Zients, the Office of Management and Budget's deputy director for management, said last week.
Many senior employees won't get raises, but will receive bonuses for good performance, although OMB and the Office of Personnel Management are telling agencies to cap bonuses at 2010 levels. OPM said it does not yet have information on fiscal 2010 bonuses, but the Asbury Park Press of New Jersey reported in June that the government paid $408 million in bonuses to 359,400 people, an average $1,135 each, in fiscal 2009.
The White House specifically exempted military service members from the freeze. And OMB said Obama's freeze will not apply to legislative branch employees.
Spokesman Mark Saunders said the U.S. Postal Service froze senior management's pay on Nov. 15.
"At this point, we have done everything under our control to limit salary increases, and the rest will be addressed through collective bargaining," Saunders said.
The Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts said judicial branch employees don't get cost-of-living adjustments unless GS employees do, so the freeze will cover them. But more than 25,000 judicial employees will receive step increases.
Federal Times calculated the $2.5 billion cost of step increases using OPM data on the number of employees at each GS grade level and step, and the within-grade increases those employees will receive over the next two years by advancing to the next step.
$2B in savings in 2011
Obama's two-year freeze proposal is less than the three-year freeze the co-chairmen of a White House-appointed deficit reduction commission are pushing for — and the White House was considering as recently as Thanksgiving week.
The White House expects the two-year freeze will save $2 billion in fiscal 2011, $28 billion over the next five years, and more than $60 billion over the next 10 years.
Congress will have to approve the pay freeze by the end of December, or a 0.9 percent increase will automatically go into effect.
Obama's proposal was swiftly denounced by federal unions and employee groups, who cited data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics that suggest private-sector salaries grew last year faster than federal wages.
"This proposal to freeze federal pay is a superficial, panicked reaction to the deficit commission report," Gage said. "This is no time for scapegoating."
The Federal Managers Association said that since civil servants are facing an average 7 percent increase in health care premiums next year, the freeze will amount to a reduction in take-home pay.
"While the president claims his proposal is not intended to punish or disrespect federal employees, a two-year pay freeze certainly feels like punishment," FMA said in a statement. "We at FMA understand the demands placed on our economy and the current state of our fiscal crisis. Taking steps to reverse our government's spending, however, should not be unduly borne by our nation's civil servants."
House Republican Whip Eric Cantor, from Virginia, applauded Obama's proposal.
"Many federal employees do important work, but this is exactly the kind of savings measure we have to make in order to begin to restore some fiscal sanity in America," Cantor said.
Reaction to the announcement by federal employees was mixed. Some who wrote to Federal Times said it is unfair to cancel their salary adjustments while the government is spending money on wars and bailouts. Others said they don't mind giving up their raises to help balance the books.
Max Stier, president of the Partnership for Public Service, said he doesn't expect a pay freeze to cause retention problems. He doesn't think retirements will spike, even though employees nearing retirement will see their salaries, a factor in their annuity calculations, stagnate for a few years, he said. He also said he expects few employees will look for work elsewhere.
"We are not likely to see a mass exodus from government, or a dramatic difference in its ability to recruit and retain employees," Stier said. "A lot of that is due to the fact that most feds are in their jobs because they care about making a difference. Money does matter to them, but it's not their dominant motivation."
But Stier said an across-the-board freeze is a bad idea. He said the government needs to overhaul how it classifies and pays its employees so it can steer more money to critical employees in high demand — such as doctors and engineers — and not give all employees massive raises.
"For certain occupations and certain levels of responsibility, there's already been a substantial gap between what they can earn in the government vs. the private sector," Stier said. "This makes that discrepancy worse."
2011 Federal Pay Scale Tables (GS) and No Raise from 2010 Levels as Obama Freezes Employee Pay
Saving to Inve$t - Following President Obama’s Federal employee pay freeze, 2011 GS tables remain the same as 2010. This includes the special base rates for GS law enforcement officers (GL) at GS grades 3 through 10. Unfortunately this means that the proposed raises discussed in previous updates below will not come to pass in 2011. The latest table is shown below, with rates effective from January 2011.
In 1953, about 75 percent of Federal employees had a GS level of 7 or below. By 2009, in contrast, more than 70 percent of the workforce was GS 8 or higher.
Obama to OK Benefits for Same-Sex Partners of Federal Workers
June 17, 2009HelpTheMiddleClass.com - President Obama will sign a memorandum Wednesday granting health care and other benefits to the same-sex partners of federal employees, two senior administration officials said.
The signing will take place in the Oval Office and follows sharp criticism of the president over a Justice Department motion filed last week in support of the Defense of Marriage Act — which opposes same-sex marriage — that used the government’s interest in opposing incestuous marriages to support its position against same-sex marriage.
Gay and lesbian advocates have also faulted the Obama administration for not moving to repeal the military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy that bars officials from asking about a service member’s sexual orientation but also bars the service member from revealing it.
The president rankled gay advocates before his inauguration when he named megachurch pastor the Rev. Rick Warren to deliver the invocation at his swearing-in. Warren, in an interview with Belief.net, likened homosexuality to bestiality and incest. He also supported California’s Proposition 8, which banned same-sex marriage in that state.
During the Warren controversy, Obama — who frequently spoke in favor of gay and lesbian rights during the campaign but has said he opposes same-sex marriage — declared himself “a fierce advocate for gay and lesbian Americans.” Report filed by CNN. For more news and information, click the link below for CNN. CNN is the leading name in cable news.
via Obama to OK benefits for same-sex partners of federal workers – CNN.com.
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