Extortionists And Heroes
The latest in the public employee compensation debate, courtesy of a wit unknown speaking through xtranormal:
I’ve never seen anything like that video. I’m not endorsing it entirely. Firefighters are compensated by local governments. Some have secured deals that border on extortion. Others not so much. Nor is “extortionist” and “hero” mutually exclusive. The most well paid firefighters in the country may well be among the most brave and accomplished in life-saving.
It’s passed along mostly because the changing image of firefighters in the public mind is noteworthy, and somewhat deserved. I wonder how widespread it will become. I’ve definitely met firefighters like the one portrayed in the video: heroes whose unions had used unsavory tactics to negotiate absurd pay packages that pushed their municipalities toward bankruptcy. In California, if pension reform doesn’t happen in the next five years or so, voters are going to do it at the ballot box.
I’ll be among them.
Ever gonna work in an industry where you’ll be advocating lower wages, worse overall compensation, and lower quality of life?
— Come Back Zinc! · Oct 18, 01:15 PM · #
Conor, in California the average pension obligation of the employing public entity is something along the lines of 1/3rd of the due. The vast majority of pension funding comes from diverted pay. The problem, in California, is the provision that bases your pension off your salary for the final three years. So if you’re a CalFire firefighter who’s been paying 16% of gross pay every year for 30 years into your pension, but your last three years on the job are as a division chief, you’ve not paid enough in to fund your share of the pension you’ll receive. This is certainly a problem in need of reform, but not every firefighter becomes a division chief. It’s a certain percentage of management-level pensions that are the egregious offenders, not the pensions in general.
— Erik Vanderhoff · Oct 18, 07:23 PM · #
Firefighting, police work, military, these are all jobs that require the person to make more money in a shorter amount of time in order to be able to comfortably retire. No amount of talking about unions changes that dynamic. If i’m forced to retire at 55 (and that’s assuming one can keep passing the physicals after their period of eligible retirement which for the military could be as early as 38), I can’t just magically survive on a 401K that’s had a decade less to mature than yours (plus you don’t get social security at 55). Nor should we ask people that risk their lives for us to have to. Maybe some sort of reform to make pensions that gradually step down could work, but ultimately there has to be some acknowledgment of why things are the way they are. Not to mention that proper taxation and not gambling with pensions would go a long way towards keeping local gov finances in order.
But to get away from the policy side and engage in some psuedo psychology, the nation as a whole seems to be simply resentful of people whose path to “success” isn’t the one they’ve been fed. You’re either supposed to go to college and end up with a good corporate job that makes you solidly middle class, or you’re supposed to be an entrepreneur. If you go to work in a factory and get that lifestyle, or you get a gov job and attain that middle class lifestyle, it’s like you cut in line. Like you obtained something that people think you should have worked harder for.
You can tell that the guy that made the video is some sophomore college kid that knows his job picture is shit. The fact that the firefighter might DIE doing his job, that it takes a toll on his body, the fact that he’s away from his family those 3 days and can’t do anything else but sit inside a firehouse etc, none of those things factor in… he just doesn’t grasp the concept of what its like to be paid for ability/talent rather then work. Because his whole life he’s been taught that hard work is what’s supposed to pay off.
— Console · Oct 22, 05:24 PM · #