Ratio: Gov't Employee Salaries & Welfare Payments Relative to Avg Annual Salary

[roo_ster]

http://pjmedia.com/instapundit/197254/
http://www.cato.org/blog/government-gold-plating

In addition to supporting members of Congress and civil servants, U.S. taxpayers support welfare recipients. And they support them lavishly, too. Hawaii, Massachusetts, and D.C. residents receive sizeable welfare payments (read: salaries). Indeed, the magnitude of these payments exceeds the average salary of an American teacher, as well as a soldier deployed in Afghanistan, by at least $10,000 per year.

Well, policritters care more about the FS Army than the US Army.

[Boomhauer]

Well, policritters care more about the FS Army than the US Army.

One votes exclusively Democrat and the other not so much...

[MillCreek]

So both those links show a pretty graph, but no data or methodology behind the numbers.  Are we supposed to blindly believe them because they come from conservatives?  I don't think so.

[roo_ster]

So both those links show a pretty graph, but no data or methodology behind the numbers.  Are we supposed to blindly believe them because they come from conservatives?  I don't think so.

You could read the source they cited at the bottom of the pretty picture.

[Marnoot]

You could read the source they cited at the bottom of the pretty picture.

Those citations are only for the government position wages, and the mean wage. No cite given for the welfare "wages".

[roo_ster]

"Russia is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma."
----Winston Churchill

Luckily, the data sought is more readily available and not nearly so esoteric.

I googled "total value of all welfare benefits hawaii" and found the 1993 study.





Edit...
I found the 2013 study actually.

[Marnoot]

Ah, but what about the total value of all welfare benefits in Russia?

[MillCreek]

http://www.forbes.com/sites/theapothecary/2013/09/02/on-labor-day-2013-welfare-pays-more-than-minimum-wage-work-in-35-states/

So according to this, Cato considers the aggregate value of this to be 'salary':

For the purposes of their study, they looked specifically at: (1) Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), the post-1996 cash welfare program; (2) the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), formerly known as food stamps; (3) Medicaid; (4) housing assistance; (5) utilities assistance; (6) the Women, Infants, and Children program (WIC), and (7) the Emergency Food Assistance Program (TEFAP).


The Cato paper does not mention if it counts the value of other benefits to the employed government workers in the graph (medical coverage, paid time off, pensions, etc.) to be counted in the definition of 'government salary'.  I bet they do not.  When I am comparing job offers, I look at the total compensation package to include the value of such benefits, rather than just looking at the annual wage.  I recall then when Ms. MillCreek 2.0 was in the Navy, that is how they calculated her total 'pay'.

[dogmush]

Glancing at the ratio, and the ~$220,000 number they gave for the congressman in the article, I can tell you that for the deployed soldier they are only using base pay.

As an E6, deployed, I take home about $75,000.  Which would skew those to bars very close to 3, not the 5 they are at.

[charby]

What about other government worker's salaries? Secretaries, Foresters, IT people, law enforcement, janitors, mail delivery people, etc.

[dogmush]

What about other government worker's salaries? Secretaries, Foresters, IT people, law enforcement, janitors, mail delivery people, etc.

I work in a blue collor job for the Department of the Army.  (Wage Grade scale for those in the know).  In my job series (5223) our wages are about 5%-10% lower then what we could make doing the same thing in the commercial sector.  This holds true here in FL, in NC, MD, Tacoma, and SoCal. (the shops that do my work that I konw the local pay of.

This cash difference is offset by less stress, less likelyhood of layoffs in slow periods (the last couple years notwithstanding) and better retirement benefits.

Several of my coworkers on this facility are GS workers, doing admin and logistics.  The cash gap for them is higher. (15% or so) but they get many of the same plusses.

Also we are all in the Reserves, and the benefit of having a job that will absolutely be there after the deployment(s) is worth quite a bit.

[tokugawa]

Are there any jobs left in the private sector? Seems like anytime I hear of an acquaintance finding a decent paying job it is in local, state, or federal paid positions- direct OT contract.

[MillCreek]

^^^I'm the private sector, and I currently have eighteen job openings posted: from medical assistants and receptionists to physicians and dentists.

[dogmush]

I'm headhunted about once a month from the local shipyards. They can offer cash,  but not long term stability.

[cassandra and sara's daddy]

The internet is a funny thing.  I changed fields a decade ago and still get calls or emails


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