I believe in limited government, more power to the states and more responsibility to the individual. I’m not a heartless conservative who believes that all federal social programs are ridiculous and unnecessary. We need that safety net, but I may argue that it is woefully inefficient and could use some tightening up.
I read a December 2009 USA article that really illustrates, to me, that our federal government is growing too large. It makes me concerned that our federal government is bloated and full of waste.
A highlights from this article worthy of discussion (please note that the time period we are talking about here is from December 2007 to June 2009):
- “Federal employees making salaries of $100,000 or more jumped from 14% to 19% of civil servants during the recession’s first 18 months — and that’s before overtime pay and bonuses are counted.”
- “When the recession started, the Transportation Department had only one person earning a salary of $170,000 or more. Eighteen months later, 1,690 employees had salaries above $170,000.”
- “The growth in six-figure salaries has pushed the average federal worker’s pay to $71,206, compared with $40,331 in the private sector.”
- The number of federal employees earning over $100k increased 46% during this time period.
- The number of federal employees earning over $150k increased over 119% during this time period.
- During this time period the federal government increased pay on average of 6.6% versus 3.9% for both state governments and the private sector.
- During this time period, the feds added jobs at a rate just shy of 10%, the largest increase since the US began Medicare and Medicaid were created in the 60’s.
Before anyone shouts out that Bush and the Republicans had a fair bit to do with this, know that I agree wholeheartedly. It was under Bush’s term that there were across the board pay increases for federal employees of 3%. He proposed it and Congress approved it in 2008.
My point being is that when I say we need to cut the budget drastically as a part of this debt ceiling, I’m not talking about taking away food from hungry children. I’m talking about being more efficient in our federal programs. Our federal payrolls have exploded because the role of government has increased so dramatically.
IMHO, we will also need a tax increase along with big time budget cuts. My views certainly are not popular with my pals. I think the $250k number is capricious because $250k is rich in some areas like Paducah, but hardly rich in San Francisco or NYC.
