Why would you uniformly dismiss people who took the time to engage your vacuous AM talkshow narrative in good faith? Could it be because you have nothing behind it save your ideology? You questioned the rationale behind public sector salaries in certain locales, and people addressed your question directly. That’s not whataboutism.
Why not?
Why not? When filling positions, the government competes with the private sector for workers. Your question literally pertains to salaries and compensation, so of course comparison to the private sector is not only relevant, but entirely necessary for any sort of context. What “return” should any municipality be getting in exchange for paying people to take out the garbage, monitor parking meters and drive buses? Meter maids are supposed to be so efficient they magically generate surplus revenue? How many passengers should bus drivers be hustling for extra fare? How much do you think a qualified Aviation Commissioner with the requisite years of experience and education should be paid? Assuming you could pay “far less” and still get the same quality of eligible candidates, how much will those savings actually impact the overall city budget over time?
I reject the nonsensical premise behind your question. The reality behind public sector salaries in places like Chicago has been explained to you, you just didn’t like the answers. I have no idea what people leaving a city in retirement has to do with your question about salaries and benefits. Paying people to work for the government is not merely some form of cash stimulus designed to generate a “return.” Suggesting it is merely betrays your
ideological premise that public sector workers are inherently a waste of money and resources. Instead of coyly asking if public sector retirement benefits should be equivalent to those in the private sector, you should at least admit you’d prefer they get virtually no retirement benefits at all,
just like in the private sector.
The reality behind your question is that public sector workers are not the mobsters you describe them to be, nor are they engaged in some kind of racket to raid cash from public coffers. Salaries for federal employees with a bachelor’s degree were roughly equivalent to their private sector counterparts. Those with higher degrees like Master’s/PhD actually earn far less than they could in the private sector. The one category where federal workers’ salaries are far higher than those in the private sector with comparable profiles is people with a HS diploma or GED, wherein federal workers earned around a third more in salary.
https://www.cbo.gov/publication/52637
One reason for the relatively better benefits and job security enjoyed by public sector employees is the much
higher rate of unionization. Perhaps private sector employees who don’t get the same level of pay or benefits should organize and close the gap. Yet for some reason you left that out of your “analysis.” The federal government also relies on private sector contractors for
nearly half of its workforce, so we are left to assume you’re only complaining about the other 50-60% of “government jobs.”
To the extent Chicago is “in trouble financially,” the city already tried to privatize some public jobs to save money. It turned out not to be the
bargain they’d hoped for. Was that a better “return” for the money?
Your disingenuous handwringing about public sector salaries is thoroughly outdated. By that I mean FDR
already exposed the ideology from whence it arises as a fraudulent set of talking points. Blaming the government for luring workers away from the private sector by offering decent pay and good benefits is especially ridiculous when private sector wage growth has been
relatively stagnant for decades. Public sector workers aren’t spoiled. Private sector workers got
ed.