Obama Orders Pay Raise for Biden, Members of Congress, Federal Workers

reply to post by gladtobehere


I love how people say that we can't find legit Polititians to help change things but when great men and women stand up and say they will take on the role and problems they never make it to a chair or even the ballot for that matter.

Yep and I get to lose mine because of them. Goody Goody.

reply to post by seeker1963

How nice for all of them. Barack is such a generous guy.

"When the people find that they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic."
-B. Franklin

Originally posted by gladtobehere
reply to post by Donahue

 

Ever since learning about EOs or Executive Orders, I've wondered how they can be Constitutional. EOs have the force of law and bypass the Congress...

As usual, I checked with the Constitution. Here is an excerpt from Article II, Section 1: "The executive Power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America." What is the executive power? Here's an excerpt from Section 3: "he shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed." In this case, the laws being faithfully executed are PL 112-175 and 5 USC 5303. So this order is both Constitutional and authorized by statute.

Originally posted by miniatus
The pay raises appear to be minimal at best .. $900 per year in most cases.. as much as I want to, I can't find myself angry about this... $75 per month .. $37.50 per pay check .. before taxes mind you.. hell, perhaps this will put them in a better mood so things get done..

We have far more pressing issues than a tiny pay increase

edit on 12/28/2012 by miniatus because: (no reason given)

I find ANY increase in Pay raises for those who are incompetent in doing their jobs, sicking.

Originally posted by marbles87
reply to post by miniatus

 

While the country is in DEBT any pay raises is a smack to the face of the American people. If anything a pay CUT!

By law, the Federal pay scale is adjusted annually according to the BLS employment compensation index. This is to keep Federal employment competitive with the private sector. For the past several years, the Federal pay scales have been frozen, even though the ECI has been positive. This means civil servants' compensation, compared to the private sector, has been decreasing.

In fact, since the pay scales have been static, and the value of the dollar is not, the real wages of an employee at a given step and grade has been decreasing. Their jobs aren't just becoming less attractive compared to the private sector, they've actually been making less due to the tax called inflation. A GS-5 step 1 today does not cost you as much as a GS-5 step 1 did two years ago. This calculator suggests it has been a 5% cut in 2010 dollars. And people are bebothered about a 0.5% increase?

The Federal bureaucracy is dirt cheap. You will never achieve significant savings by (further) cutting the bureaucracy's pay. The cost of government is in programs, not people.

reply to post by FurvusRexCaeli


Regardless of inflation or not if the money is not there it is not there. If they we were atleast making some progress toward fixing the deficit no one would complain. They will cut education for our youth this year so until they start adding to the budget to these crucial areas through a budget surplus no raise is in order regardless of any prior approval. Do you think they knew we would be 15 trillion in the hole when they agreed to the raise.... Yeah they probably knew.

It's a minimal pay raise. Do YOU expect a yearly pay raise? Most companies give them out you know - it's to offset inflation usually.

Typical though - people wouldn't be happy unless all politicians were making minimum wage, working 120 hours a week while making amazing changes to our government that everyone was pleased with.

reply to post by fleabit


HUGE difference between me busting ass with minimal benefits vs our Polititians doing nothing then twiddling their thumbs, then lunch, then vacation. All the while every Tom dick and Harry is losing their ass and living out of shoe boxes.

reply to post by seeker1963



Well if this is true kiss the republic good bye. Obama has no authority over congressional pay... But if congress goes along with this (and they will) then they are all in subversion and treason to the USA! Of course this is not the first time they would be. They should all be arrested and tried! But whose going to do that? The brain washed military? Not likely...

Oh well another day in the post republic oligarchy of the USA... Sigh!

reply to post by FurvusRexCaeli

The Federal bureaucracy is dirt cheap. You will never achieve significant savings by (further) cutting the bureaucracy's pay.

WHAT? Barry Soetoro, is that you????

I really don't know what to say other than you are totally clueless as to the corruption called the government of the U.S.!

Bureaucracy is cheap???? I am just speechless................Had a few too many beers, so I will come back to address your ignorance of reality when I am more in the state of mind not to get a warning for violating T&C...

It`s ok they will probably just freeze or cut disability pay for veterans and people on social security to pay for these raises. It`s good thing that everyone is tightening their belts in these hard financial times or this country would be in real financial trouble.

This is just more proof that all politicians are just self serving %$@&&**.

I think this move is more about the action than the number,
they're trying to encourage loyalty in the govt. services

reply to post by seeker1963


Yesterday I posted on my facebook about doing something about this countries sad, sorry condition.
And I posted the address for white house .gov's petition page. The petition I signed was about putting a 3 year cap on all higher government workers salaries. The cap the petition is for is $75,000 a year. Hardly a hardship. The adress for this page was posted on Above top secret yesterday. Please sign it. Every petition needs a certain number of signatures within 30 days. The address was given in relation to Diane Feinstein's gun law. I will gladly send it to you if you pass it on. We must as a people begin to do something about this countries state or we will have no one to blame but our selves. Thanks for your post! It's wonderful

reply to post by seeker1963


Strangely it won't let me copy it but it's http//; petitions/ Whitehouse. Gov pass it on!

Biden - "They think that's all I make"

For the past several years, the Federal pay scales have been frozen

Federal workers haven't got any cost of living increases for around 5 years, so this isn't really a terrible thing, though I think this should only apply to regular government workers and not congress, who already make more than enough.

Originally posted by seeker1963
reply to post by FurvusRexCaeli
WHAT? Barry Soetoro, is that you????

You couldn't be farther from the truth ....

If you can, find the March/April 2011 issue of The Washington Monthly. There's a story by John Gravois that addresses this very issue. It concentrates on the lack of qualified contracting officers in the DOD, but also touches on insufficient and underpaid personnel in the Minerals Management Service leading to Deepwater Horizon, and insufficient staffing in the SEC. Granted, this is more about hiring than compensation, but anyone can see the two issues are intertwined. The Federal workforce is not sufficient to meet the missions given to it by the public, and that has had consequences. Freezing pay while the cost of living and employment cost index go up will not attract good people to the civil service.

Douglas Amy has also done some research on bureaucracy, and while I disagree with his thesis and naked political bias, he makes a few good points. We don't want to pay the government what we pay businesses, because government has a monopoly on many important services (defense, justice, etc.). We want to maximize the value of those services, not minimize how much we pay for them. Paying less and getting less is a suboptimal outcome.

The meat of my post, which you seem to be objecting to, is that bureaucracy is cheap and programs are expensive. Even if you believe that bureaucracy is expensive, you must admit that bureaucracy only exists to carry out programs. Bureaucracies don't authorize or appropriate for programs, Congress does that. Some of the larger agencies like the military departments push for more spending, but for the most part Federal bureaucracy has little say in how much money it gets. They simply spend what Congress gives them, in accordance with goals set by Congress.

But let's look at an example and compare the cost of bureaucracy vs. the program. Intuitively, I think most programs exist to give things away and do things. Measuring the doing of things is difficult (even if you can measure output, how do you quantify outcome?), so we'll stick with giving away for now.

Social Security exists to give away money, SSI, SSDI, and some others. The bureaucracy that handles this program is the Social Security Administration (SSA). The SSA has 66,000 employees, with annual salaries from ranging $199,700 (the Commissioner) to $31,315 (entry-level with a four year degree) and less. Let's make the outrageous assumption that everyone in the SSA is paid what the Commissioner gets. The cost of the bureaucracy would be $13,180,200,000. The SSA disburses $820,730,000,000 in SSI and SSDI. Even if we make the outrageous assumption that everyone in the SSA is paid at the executive schedule, the bureaucracy is still a drop in the bucket compared to the cost of the program itself. And keep in mind, $199,700 is peanuts for an executive in charge of this kind of money. Can you imagine any CEO in private industry accepting $199,700 to oversee an $820 billion operation? (All numbers are from 2012 or 2012 estimates.)

You'll find similar facts in other agencies. What the government gives away, what it buys, and what it does costs a great deal of money. The people who handle the giving away, buying, and doing don't cost very much. At some levels, they cost much less than what they could command in the private sector. At other levels, they may cost slightly more, but this can be justified by the principle that you don't want the lowest bidder doing your government's work. And many agencies are understaffed, so more attractive compensation packages may draw people better able to handle multiple assignments.

I really don't know what to say other than you are totally clueless as to the corruption called the government of the U.S.!

Bureaucracy is cheap???? I am just speechless................Had a few too many beers,

I agree, you have had a few too many beers. Best to call it a night.

reply to post by cartesia


^^THIS

Originally posted by hawkiye
reply to post by seeker1963

 

Well if this is true kiss the republic good bye. Obama has no authority over congressional pay...

Under 5 USC 5305, the President can alter the annual increase to the General Schedule. Under 2 USC 31, Congressional pay increases whenever GS pay does. Obama suspended the annual GS increase, so Congress's pay was affected, too.