Overpaid Government Workers

Next time somebody talks about the poor, underpaid, selfless public servants:

A typical full-time state or local government worker made $78,853 in wages and benefits in the third quarter of 2006, $25,771 more than a typical private-sector worker, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports. The difference was $7,604 in 2000. The compensation advantage holds true for all types of public workers, from teachers to laborers and managers. Better benefits for government workers is the biggest reason for the growing compensation gap.

And let’s not forget those lovely retirement benefits too:

Pensions for civil servants often are superior to private pensions in subtle ways that make a huge financial difference. For example, government pensions:

•Generally base benefits on a worker’s top three earning years. Private pensions typically base benefits on the top five years of pay, which lowers the average.

•Often let retirees add the value of overtime, unused leave and other benefits into the pension formula. The results can be extreme. Dover, N.H., Police Chief William Fenniman, 46, added more than $200,000 for severance, sick leave and other payouts into his three-year salary average when he retired in January. This will boost his retirement benefit to as much as $125,000 a year, more than he made as chief.

•Permit early retirement at age 50 or 55 with less of a benefit reduction than private pensions.

•Provide free or subsidized medical care for retirees under age 65 and supplemental coverage after that for those on Medicare.

•More often provide automatic cost-of-living increases to benefits.

Our Tax money at work.  Just remember this the next time you hear the sob stories about how little money government has to provide services since the stingy taxpayers won’t pay up.   Most of what you provide in taxes goes straight into the pockets of your “public servants”.