3. You sound very ignorant even comparing their pay and benefits to the private sector.
I imagine that you’re responding to the facts I’ve previously laid out demonstrating that the average federal government employee earns a salary of approximately $128k in total compensation including the annual benefits. The average private sector employee earns a gross salary of approximately $49k annually. The average salary in the armed forces across all positions is currently about $46k per year with soldiers earning an average of $34,000 per year.
It’s not ignorance on my part, it’s just the opposite and I’ve had many federal employees argue that it’s not appropriate to compare federal employees to the private sector. I can’t for the life of me figure out how that’s logical. 84% of those working in the United States are not in government at any level. These are the people paying the taxes and thus the salaries and benefits of those in government theoretically working for them.
I’ve even had some suggest that because federal employees pay taxes too it doesn’t matter. The bottom line is that the average person in federal government who’s tasked with working for the average citizen earns well more than double the total compensation of that citizen. And then the average citizen is supposed to feel guilty when a small slice of the federal government employees face adversity for a few weeks. Something about that doesn’t seem right to me.
As for my compensation, I’ve been blessed by amazing listeners and advertisers that have provided me with an opportunity to earn more than I’d thought possible 22 years ago. That being said, like just about anyone with a meaningful degree of career success it certainly didn’t start out that way.
I’ve never dedicated a six-part series to any topic on any day. I want to thank Ignacio for the thoughtfulness of his note. It’s provided me with an opportunity to comprehensively address just about every angle represented by the partial government shutdown. If the premise of anything is false anything built on it will be too.
Here we are in the longest partial government shutdown in US history. Have you even noticed? While 6% of essential service professionals are working and unfortunately don’t know when they’ll be paid next, 19% of the federal government is fully non-operational and yet life goes on. For me this is the teachable moment that unfortunately isn’t instilled through our education system.
Sometimes truth and the resulting perspective is provocative and challenging to your thoughts and the status quo. Ironically that’s the intended role of news media. That we’re having this conversation demonstrates just how derelict of duty almost all news media has become. Incidentally once I reached out to Ignacio, I received this in return.
Thank you, I apologize if I was out of hand, I’m just so tired of both parties not doing what they are there to do and they’re taken care of, their kids and grand kids are taken care of. This isn’t the way our founders wanted the country run.
Don’t apologize for anything. If everyone were as passionate about this country and as considered and thoughtful as you, we’d have a far more responsible and responsive government. May God bless you and thank you for listening and taking the time to reach out to me.
Photo By: Kim Tunnicliffe/WBZ NewsRadio1030