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

[Snaquebite]

President Barack Obama issued an executive order to end the pay freeze on federal employees, in effect giving some federal workers a raise. One federal worker now to receive a pay increase is Vice President Joe Biden.

According to disclosure forms, Biden made a cool $225,521 last year. After the pay increase, he'll now make $231,900 per year.

Members of Congress, from the House and Senate, also will receive a little bump, as their annual salary will go from $174,000 to 174,900. Leadership in Congress, including the speaker of the House, will likewise get an increase.

Here's the list of new wages, as attached to President Obama's executive order:

http://m.weeklystandard.com/blogs/ob...rs_692223.html

Must be because of the great job they're doing.

[Box]

How odd is it that these CAREER politicians that seem to have incomes that come in UNDER the POTUS magic 250,000 a year 'evil rich guy' water mark, yet, by any stretch of research you can easily see how these folks are some of the richest folks in the country...
...while doing such hard work on such a meager salary.

[Paslode]

Originally Posted by Billy L-bach

How odd is it that these CAREER politicians that seem to have incomes that come in UNDER the POTUS magic 250,000 a year 'evil rich guy' water mark, yet, by any stretch of research you can easily see how these folks are some of the richest folks in the country...
...while doing such hard work on such a meager salary.

While the right hand is accepting their salary, the left hand is under the table accepting bribes from lobbyists.

[The Reaper]

This 0.5% raise is the first raise for Federal civilian employees in three years.

Government civil service pay is not what most people think it is, anymore than military pay is.

TR

[Gypsy]

I haven't had a raise in six years. Just sayin'.

[tunanut]

We wouldn't want to loose such quality employees now would we?

[kgoerz]

Originally Posted by Billy L-bach

How odd is it that these CAREER politicians that seem to have incomes that come in UNDER the POTUS magic 250,000 a year 'evil rich guy' water mark, yet, by any stretch of research you can easily see how these folks are some of the richest folks in the country...
...while doing such hard work on such a meager salary.

Until recently there were no restrictions on insider trading in Congress. They finally stopped them. But their families can invest in anything still. Even their Wife. So basically they still insider trade. They lagally do what Martha Stewart went to jail for.

[Ape Man]

These discussions about the salary of government workers typically generates more heat than light in my humble opinion. The fact that all federal workers are getting a raise is symptomatic of a real problem. Having said that, if the federal government fails to offer a raise, many parts of the Federal government will degrade in service.

As an example: At the government run mental hospital where I work many of the doctors don't have MD licenses. Or rather, all they have is temporary ones until they can pass the real test. These temporary licenses have time limit after which they expire. What a lot of our "doctors" do is travel from state to state using these temporary licenses because they can't pass there real one. Apparently there is some kind of period after which they can re-acquire a temporary license because the same doctors keep coming back through on this revolving door system.

Now none of these quacks deserves to be paid one red cent in my humble opinion. But at the same time, the State desperately needs better quality doctors in its mental hospitals if it even wants to have the pretense of offering medical care to the people in its care. The few competent doctors we have really do make a difference.

The competent doctors don't work here for the money (they could make a lot more elsewhere). They generally say they take a state job because they have paid off their school loans and they want to spend more time with their family. The problem is that there is not enough doctors in the world willing to give up 50 grand to spend more time with their family to fully staff a hospital. And to make maters worse, some of the ones who are willing to give up that kind of money for more time with their family leave because they can't stomach the kinds of things that the revolving door quacks do.

The bottom line is that we need to pay the doctors more so that we can attract quality doctors and everyone on up to the commissioner knows it. Moreover, the money needed to pay the doctors more is small change compared to the overall budget. The problem is that the way the state is set up you can't give the doctors more money with out giving just about everybody a raise.

I could give you countless examples of the same type of problem. There are a lot of key positions that can not be filled with quality people because the state does not pay enough. And there are a lot of jobs where the state pays plenty. The problem is the government is incapable of making the distinction when it comes to raises. And so is most of the public. To them, if 51% of the workers are overpaid, they are all overpaid and there is no real public pressure to come up with a better system of paying public employees. Most people just want to pay them all less if they even think about the issue.

[Box]

Until recently there were no restrictions on insider trading in Congress. They finally stopped them. But their families can invest in anything still. Even their Wife. So basically they still insider trade. They legally do what Martha Stewart went to jail for.

...corruption sucks most when you aren't getting your beak wet!


I also love how they like to tell us they WE need to tighten OUR belts because of the hard times that THEY caused mismanaging the public coffers. On the bright side, the US is governed by some of the best politicians that money can buy, so at least we have that on our side.

[Knight]

Good for them!! This administration has to keep the backbone of this new, evil empire that it's developing strong-grow "it" even bigger!

[Badger52]

I could be wrong but thought Congress is supposed to set that pay and do it in such a way that it cannot take effect (for legislators or other elected officials) until at least the next term. This use of an Executive Order for other than executive branch civil service (who've been frozen since he volunteered them as the usual example a POTUS uses to show "we here are sacrificing too") sounds kind of hinky as applied to elected officials.


In my mind they'd all be relying on their investment angles to live because they shouldn't draw a dime of salary for "failure to achieve even the most basic performance objectives for which they were hired."

[Dad]

a technicallity, but I believe Martha went to prison for lying to a grand jury. further proof the cover up is as likely to get you as the crime.

[Streck-Fu]

Originally Posted by The Reaper

This 0.5% raise is the first raise for Federal civilian employees in three years.

Government civil service pay is not what most people think it is, anymore than military pay is.

TR

I disagree with regard to most civil service salaries. While most of the salaries do not seem all that high on paper, the government is putting younger new highers in much higher pay grades than before.

Newly graduated from college engineers, logisticians, etc are being hired as GS-10 with GS-11 in year or two and GS-12 within 5 years or so. GS-11 used to be a management grade but has become a working grade over the last several years.

Combined with their retirement benefits (as they exist now) they are paid at a fairly higher level than private sector employed counterparts.

[echoes]

Originally Posted by Snaquebite

http://m.weeklystandard.com/blogs/ob...rs_692223.html

Members of Congress, from the House and Senate, also will receive a little bump, as their annual salary will go from $174,000 to 174,900. Leadership in Congress, including the speaker of the House, will likewise get an increase.

Must be because of the great job they're doing.

Agree Sir! Hey Congress....the extra $900 means now you really, really are going to get us off the fiscal cliff...right?

Ay, yi yi!

Holly

[kgoerz]

Originally Posted by The Reaper

This 0.5% raise is the first raise for Federal civilian employees in three years.

Government civil service pay is not what most people think it is, anymore than military pay is.

TR

I remember when people in the private sector were making all the bucks. Now the private sector sucks for jobs. So Govt. workers are considered pampered and over paid. It's a well deserved pay raise. How the politicians who have made millions in insider trading accepted their raises........doesn't surprise me one bit.