“The federal government reported Friday that on average its employees are underpaid by 26.3 percent when compared with similar non-federal jobs, a “pay gap” that increased by about 2 percentage points over the last year while federal salary rates were frozen.” — Federal employees make average 26 percent less than private workers, Labor agency reports
HOWEVER, CONSERVATIVE GROUPS CONTINUE TO ARGUE that federal workers are overpaid. Here’s Matthew Yglesias’ full explaination of that rationalization, and my summary:
- The federal government needs to fill some jobs. But it offers salaries that are less than the salaries that a person doing a similar job could get in the private sector.
- Naturally, this means that the federal government ends up attracting less-experienced applicants.
- Hiring is then done from this less-experienced pool.
- And since the people who are hired are doing jobs they’d be [initially] underqualified for in the private sector, they are making more money than they would be in the private sector.
- CONCLUSION: federal workers are overpaid!
IT’S IMPORTANT FOR THE REPUBLICAN TEAPARTY TO CONTINUE BATTERING FEDERAL EMPLOYEES though. It’s part of the “The Republican Strategy,” which is – in part:
The Republican strategy is to split the vast middle and working class – pitting unionized workers against non-unionized, public-sector workers against non-public, older workers within sight of Medicare and Social Security against younger workers who don’t believe these programs will be there for them, and the poor against the working middle class.
By splitting working America along these lines, Republicans hope to deflect attention from the big story. That’s the increasing share of total income and wealth going to the richest 1 percent while the jobs and wages of everyone else languish.
Occupy Wall Street now. Occupy the Voting Booth in 2012.
