Americans Should Be Enraged by the Exorbitant Compensation of Federal Workers and Contractors
Federal workers earn 30-40% more than their private sector counterparts, qualify for a three-tier retirement plan which includes lifetime pensions, and may retire while still in their 50s, yet those who pay their salaries may have to wait until 70 to collect reduced Social Security benefits. Federal workers and contractors produce nothing and add nothing to the GDP; virtually all they do is rule over and regulate every aspect of our lives.77,000 Feds Earn More Than Their Governors, Report Finds
GovExec.com - More than 77,000 federal workers earned more than the governors of their states in 2009, according to a new report.
The research found 18,351 federal medical officers earned more than their governors -- the most common occupation to out-earn states' top government executives. More than 5,000 air traffic controllers, 4,346 attorneys, 16 outdoor recreation planners and one interior designer also earned more than the governors of their respective states, the report said.
The Congressional Research Service report, requested by Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., based its comparison on 2009 federal salary data from the Office of Personnel Management and 2009 salaries of governors from the Council of State Governments. The research is dated May 6 and was first reported Tuesday by The Washington Times.
The report did not examine salaries of employees in the Office of the Vice President, White House, CIA, U.S. Postal Service or a handful of other government agencies.
Governor salaries ranged between $70,000 in Maine and $212,179 in California in 2009, according to the report, which noted that California Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger waived his payment while in office. The governors of Virginia and New Jersey tied for fifth highest salaries in 2009 at $175,000; in Virginia, 606 feds earned more than that figure.
Colorado had the most federal employees -- 10,875 -- with salaries higher than the state's governor, who earned $90,000 in 2009. Maryland placed second, with 7,283 feds earning more than Democratic Gov. Martin O'Malley's salary of $150,000 -- including 2,266 medical officers, 51 employees in human resources, and 30 employees in information and arts. Delaware had the fewest number of federal employees -- 37 -- earning more than the governor, the report found.
The American Federation of Government Employees, the largest federal employee union, pointed to proposed legislation that would cap at $200,000 federal reimbursement for contractor salaries.
"The government's paying $700,000 and more for contractor salaries, and Sen. Coburn worries about the pay of physicians who care for wounded soldiers?" Beth Moten, AFGE's legislative and political director, asked in an emailed statement.
In an emailed response to Government Executive, Coburn said no one would disagree that federal employees should be paid adequately.
"We can all agree on the importance of paying highly specialized doctors to care for wounded soldiers and veterans, or skilled engineers for their services," he said. "However, when our nation is over $14 trillion in debt and American families are struggling to make ends meet, this report begs for an explanation of why interior designers, recreation planners and other public employees are enjoying higher salaries than state governors."
Database Lists Top Federal Earners in 2011
GovExec.com - The highest paid federal employees in 2011 worked primarily in the medical field at government health agencies, according to data compiled by a company that specializes in connecting businesses through technology.
The top 1,000 federal salaries this year ranged from $216,345 to $350,000, with most of the highest earners working at the National Institutes of Health and at the Indian Health Service, according to the data. WikiOrgCharts, a company that seeks to connect businesses and people through a social customer relationship management tool, requested the information from the government through the Freedom of Information Act and developed a crowdsourced database that contains profiles of 1.2 million federal employees. The profiles list employees' names, title or job field, agency, and in many cases, their annual base salary.
"Some people can look at this and say these public servants make too much money," said Farhan Memon, WikiOrgCharts founder and chief executive officer. But Memon said many of the top earners are having a "generational impact" on the study of disease and could command much more in the private sector. "I don't know that you can put a price tag on that," he said.
Topping the 2011 list is Dr. Electron Kebebew, a medical officer at NIH who is widely regarded in the field of cancer research. Dr. Anthony Fauci, who directs the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, garnered the No. 3 slot on the list, earning an annual salary of $335,000 in 2011. Fauci has led NIAID since 1984 and is one of the country's leading clinicians and researchers in the field of HIV/AIDS.
Other top earners included employees at the Farm Credit Administration, Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, and the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Memon said some people have contacted WikiOrgCharts requesting removal from the database, which anyone can access. But the information contained in it is public and most government employees on the list understand that, he said, adding that centralizing such data and making it easy to search improves government transparency. In addition, the database serves as a kind of LinkedIn or similar social media tool, helping people in and out of government connect with one another. For example, Memon said one government contractor used the database to figure out the appropriate federal contact, while another used the information as a recruiting tool to see how much a potential hire was earning.
WikiOrgCharts also created organizational charts with employee profiles for certain large private sector companies, including Wal-Mart, Exxon-Mobil, Apple and Google.
Memon said he expects WikiOrgCharts will produce more lists and compilations based on the government data.
"Once you have a data set, there are multiple ways to cut and slice it," he said.
Senate-passed Defense Bill Would Cap Contractor Pay
GovExec.com - The 2012 Defense authorization bill, which the Senate passed Thursday night in a 93-7 vote, includes an amendment to cap the amount that defense contractors can be reimbursed for any employee's salary at $400,000.
Such a cap is opposed by many in the contractor community, and the Obama administration has favored a lower cap that would apply only to senior executives.
The amendment, approved by voice vote, was offered by Sens. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif.; Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa; and Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va.
Under current law, a contractor can charge taxpayers $693,951 for the salaries of each of its five highest-paid employees, based on a formula adopted in the late 1990s.
"Taxpayers should not be on the hook for exorbitant government contractor salaries," Boxer said in a statement. "This amendment ensures that no defense contractor will make more in taxpayer funds than the president of the United States."
Grassley said,
"We can't afford to waste increasingly limited defense dollars. This amendment goes after an unnecessary expenditure by containing runaway spending in a type of contract used extensively by the Department of Defense."
The House-passed version of the Defense bill would extend the current cap of slightly less than $700,000 to all employees.
The Boxer amendment is opposed by an alliance of contractors called the Acquisition Reform Working Group. In a Nov. 29 letter, the group warned it "could force companies to reduce its employees' compensation; in turn, these shrinking salaries will make the defense sector less attractive to top talent, which could then negatively impact DoD missions."
The harm to defense companies from lowering the cap, the contractors continued, "would be further compounded by broadening the scope of application to cover all federal contractor employees; highly skilled innovators and technology experts would likely focus their skill sets on the commercial market, thus eliminating the government's ability to develop effective critical mission solutions."
Debate on the Senate floor was tinged by the week's broader political dispute over whether to raise taxes on the wealthy to pay for an extension of a "holiday" on Social Security taxes.
Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said, "while targeting the middle class, Republicans proposed to do nothing to cut back on excessive subsidies for many large corporations that benefit from government contracts." Reid said the contractors, who now total 5 million, "caught fire during the Republican control of the presidency."
Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said his party's proposal to pay for the Social Security holiday by extending the freeze on federal pay, "is a much smarter approach to extending the temporary payroll tax cut than the one proposed by Democrats involving permanent tax hikes on job creators."
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