# Obama freezes federal worker pay for 2 years **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [November 29, 2010, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-freezes-federal-worker-pay-for-2-years/562301 "2010-11-29T17:43:10Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 15
**Author:** ![flickster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/7bcc69/32.png) [@flickster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/flickster)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 4:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-freezes-federal-worker-pay-for-2-years/562301/281 "2010-12-03T04:48:22Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > What was OUR air like during the industrial revolution? We’ve all seen the pictures of steel mill towns back in those days, but there is a HUGE difference. Was the current technology available during our industrial revolution - NO ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 6:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-freezes-federal-worker-pay-for-2-years/562301/282 "2010-12-03T06:05:35Z")
> [@yorick73](#): > > If you have evidence to the contrary please post it. You make a valid point but, as federal income taxes have increased, we have not had a decrease in medicare and SS that would offset the supposed rising tax revenue. There is something striking about that supposed 19% of GDP figure. > > I would also argue that the economy is not like the government. The economy consists of millions of individuals making individual decisions every moment of every day. Unlike the government, the economy can react very quickly to events. Regardless, tax increases or decreases are never overnight events…most are planned months or years in advace. I would say that a great deal of responsiveness and elasticity are not necessary to adjust accordingly over these time frames. Its in the graph. They compare TOP MARGINAL INCOME TAX RATES with TOTAL TAXES COLLECTED FROM ALL SOURCES. BTW when the heck have federal income taxes increased? There is nothing magical about taht 19%. Every time they cut one place they add someplace else. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 6:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-freezes-federal-worker-pay-for-2-years/562301/283 "2010-12-03T06:07:33Z")
> [@flickster](#): > > OMG, if there is one thing worse than Government control, it’s control by the union And the only thing worse than that is the absence of unions and government. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 6:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-freezes-federal-worker-pay-for-2-years/562301/284 "2010-12-03T06:26:31Z")
> [@flickster](#): > > We’ve all seen the pictures of steel mill towns back in those days, but there is a HUGE difference. Was the current technology available during our industrial revolution - NO So it doesn’t matter than 90% of the carbon in the air was put there by the industrialized nations and the fact that China is reducing emissions by 40% (the article I read didn’t say anything about “per gdp” emissions, but it still seems like a lot of reduction relative to productivity). ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 6:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-freezes-federal-worker-pay-for-2-years/562301/285 "2010-12-03T06:29:17Z")
> [@Una\_Persson](#): > > Unless the population decreases, the environment doesn’t give a damn about better GDP-GHG efficiency if the net result is more emissions. I thought this was one of the most damnning criticisms of the Bush Administration position, in fact - that so long as GDP/CO2 increased, things were improving. So let’s not be giving the Chinese - or the Americans, or even Lichtenstein a break on this. The US has a lot to do, no sugar-coating that one, but so does China. > > How the hell did we get here from Obama freezing Federal pay? It went from federal pay to other spending cuts (and tax increases) and that led to a discussion on taxes. This led to health care which led to someone pointing out taht the Obama plan was actually the Republican plan in 1993 which led to someone pointing out taht cap and trade was originally a Republican plan as well. ---
**Author:** ![erez](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e47c2d/32.png) [@erez](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/erez)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 7:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-freezes-federal-worker-pay-for-2-years/562301/286 "2010-12-03T07:12:13Z")
Krugman once again proved how he twists the facts to fit his partisan point of view in the NYT op-ed about Obama’s freezing of federal worker pay: [http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/03/opinion/03krugman.html?hp](http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/03/opinion/03krugman.html?hp). [QUOTE=Krugman] For one thing, those workers aren’t overpaid. Federal salaries are, on average, somewhat less than those of private-sector workers with equivalent qualifications. [/QUOTE] He carefully talks about “salaries,” not about the total compensation, which gives more comprehensive picture. The benefits of federal workers were $41,791/year vs. $10,589/year in the private industry. (BEA, [http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2010-12-01-fedpay01\_ST\_N.htm](http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2010-12-01-fedpay01_ST_N.htm)). He also doesn’t mention the number of days worked per year or job security. [QUOTE=Krugman] The actual savings, about $5 billion over two years, are chump change given the scale of the deficit. [/QUOTE] Notice how he talks about the savings over just two years? How about when he talks about extending tax cuts for high-income individuals? “Never mind the $700 billion price tag for extending the high-end tax breaks” ([http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/20/opinion/20krugman.html](http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/20/opinion/20krugman.html)). That time it was over 10 years. Or in the current piece: "Just as a reminder, over the next **75 years** the cost of making those tax cuts permanent would be roughly equal to the entire expected financial shortfall of Social Security. " This type of biased partisan dishonesty and cherry-picking of data happens in most of Krugman’s writing. He can’t be taken seriously. ---
**Author:** ![furt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/439d5e/32.png) [@furt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/furt)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 12:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-freezes-federal-worker-pay-for-2-years/562301/287 "2010-12-03T12:02:16Z")
> [@erez](#): > > He carefully talks about “salaries,” not about the total compensation, which gives more comprehensive picture. Note also the “equivalent qualification” caveat. There is a substantial number of people who have higher pay grades based on unneeded degrees. For example: a job for a proofreader will typically pay at a GS-7 or 8 and require a BA. But if that proofreader has an MA, he’s now a GS-9 or 10, regardless of whether or not that MA has anything at all to do with material at hand. Give him a PhD and he’s a GS-11 or 12. The Federal Government hiring process is all about qualifications, not competence. The private sector has companies like that, too … however they tend to be in the process of putting themselves out of business. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 1:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-freezes-federal-worker-pay-for-2-years/562301/288 "2010-12-03T13:58:04Z")
> [@flickster](#): > > OMG, if there is one thing worse than Government control, it’s control by the union You’re right - workers should never organize in their capacity as workers, and act in concert to represent their own interests. Workers should be infantile and have no agency. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 2:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-freezes-federal-worker-pay-for-2-years/562301/289 "2010-12-03T14:19:59Z")
> [@Una\_Persson](#): > > Unless the population decreases, the environment doesn’t give a damn about better GDP-GHG efficiency if the net result is more emissions. I thought this was one of the most damnning criticisms of the Bush Administration position, in fact - that so long as GDP/CO2 increased, things were improving. So let’s not be giving the Chinese - or the Americans, or even Lichtenstein a break on this. The US has a lot to do, no sugar-coating that one, but so does China. > > How the hell did we get here from Obama freezing Federal pay? Damned if I know. I went away for awhile, and by the time I checked back in on page 4, people were talking about practically everything. At any rate, I think there are limits to what China can reasonably be expected to do. If the more mature economies (USA, Canada, Europe, Japan, Korea, Australia, NZ) were to also cut CO2 by 40% per unit of GDP between now and 2020, our overall decrease would be substantially bigger than their total increase. So we’d be bending the curve down already, and China’s not going to keep growing at 10% or even 7-8% indefinitely, in which case their total emissions will start to go down as well after awhile. Unless there’s reason to believe they can do a lot more than 40% reduction per unit of GDP but just aren’t willing to, I think China’s got a point in that we’re giving them a Hobson’s choice between unrealistic reductions in CO2 per unit of GDP, and artificially stunting their economic growth. There are other ways of reducing China’s growth rate that are more organic, for lack of a better word. The big one would be for the rest of the developed world - especially the USA - to let them know that if they continue to keep their currency artificially weak, then we’ll institute tariffs on imports from China to adjust for their artificially devalued currency. And it’s that artificially cheap yuan that keeps their exports cheap, and fuels their growth rate. That needs to be done anyway to pull the rest of the world out of recession or near-recession, but it would also have the salutary effect of slowing down Chinese economic growth and reducing their emissions growth simply due to the dictates of other economic forces. ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 2:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-freezes-federal-worker-pay-for-2-years/562301/290 "2010-12-03T14:40:15Z")
> [@erez](#): > > The benefits of federal workers were $41,791/year vs. $10,589/year in the private industry. Comparison of an almost exclusively white-collar group to the general workforce is obviously irrelevant. > [@](#): > > This type of biased partisan dishonesty and cherry-picking of data Mr Kettle? Mr Pot called. Something about your failure to reflect enough light… ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 2:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-freezes-federal-worker-pay-for-2-years/562301/291 "2010-12-03T14:46:40Z")
> [@erez](#): > > Notice how he talks about the savings over just two years? How about when he talks about extending tax cuts for high-income individuals? “Never mind the $700 billion price tag for extending the high-end tax breaks” ([http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/20/opinion/20krugman.html](http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/20/opinion/20krugman.html)). That time it was over 10 years. Um… so what? He’s talking about the savings over two years because _that’s how long the freeze is for_. It’s also possible that he’s talking about the cost of extending the tax cuts over 10 years because _that’s the likely duration of the extension_. There are certainly legitimate arguments against Krugman’s position, but this one is simply legitimately moronic. ---
**Author:** ![yorick73](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/b5a626/32.png) [@yorick73](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yorick73)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-freezes-federal-worker-pay-for-2-years/562301/292 "2010-12-03T17:00:10Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > Its in the graph. > > They compare TOP MARGINAL INCOME TAX RATES with TOTAL TAXES COLLECTED FROM ALL SOURCES. > > BTW when the heck have federal income taxes increased? > > There is nothing magical about taht 19%. Every time they cut one place they add someplace else. Yes, the graph shows that that federal revenue hovers around 19% of GDP. I asked if you have evidence to the contrary. And, no, they compare TOP MARGINAL INCOME TAX RATES with TOTAL FEDERAL REVENUE AS A PERCENTAGE OF GDP. And, finally, the last federal income tax increase was under Clinton. ---
**Author:** ![Kearsen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/82dd89/32.png) [@Kearsen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kearsen)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-freezes-federal-worker-pay-for-2-years/562301/293 "2010-12-03T17:06:57Z")
> [@RTFirefly](#): > > Sure. When they’ve got good unions that ensure they can make enough money in 40 hours a week so that they don’t need to work OT to support a family, so they can tend to this sort of thing evenings and weekends. So basically the “too stupid” people don’t necessarily need the government but they do need SOMEONE to look after their best interests. That is simply preposterous. ---
**Author:** ![Dinsdale](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/97f17d/32.png) [@Dinsdale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dinsdale)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-freezes-federal-worker-pay-for-2-years/562301/294 "2010-12-03T17:11:55Z")
> [@Kearsen](#): > > So basically the “too stupid” people don’t necessarily need the government but they do need SOMEONE to look after their best interests. > That is simply preposterous. So if they don’t need anyone looking after their best interest, they will forego seeking assistance via bankruptcy, welfare, or any other public programs once they fuck themselves up? 😛 ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-freezes-federal-worker-pay-for-2-years/562301/295 "2010-12-03T17:25:48Z")
> [@Kearsen](#): > > So basically the “too stupid” people don’t necessarily need the government but they do need SOMEONE to look after their best interests. > That is simply preposterous. Where did he say the people were stupid? The point of a union is to equalize bargaining power, not to protect the stupid. ---
**Author:** ![Kearsen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/82dd89/32.png) [@Kearsen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kearsen)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 5:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-freezes-federal-worker-pay-for-2-years/562301/296 "2010-12-03T17:30:25Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > Where did he say the people were stupid? The point of a union is to equalize bargaining power, not to protect the stupid. It didn’t start with the union, it started with the government (put there to protect the people) After the government facade is broken, or the union, or the whatever else you wish to put up in it’s place. When do people get to stand up and realize that they either succeed or fuck up ON THEIR OWN. Where is the personal responsibility? ---
**Author:** ![Jas09](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/d07c76/32.png) [@Jas09](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jas09)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-freezes-federal-worker-pay-for-2-years/562301/297 "2010-12-03T17:31:43Z")
> [@Kearsen](#): > > So basically the “too stupid” people don’t necessarily need the government but they do need SOMEONE to look after their best interests. > That is simply preposterous. You are the only person using the word stupid. If you can’t understand why a blue-collar worker working doubles with no money for a financial adviser and very little in the way of “disposable” income might have more difficulty planning for retirement than a white-collar office worker that has time to post on a message board during the day, then I don’t know what to tell you. ---
**Author:** ![Kearsen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/82dd89/32.png) [@Kearsen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kearsen)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-freezes-federal-worker-pay-for-2-years/562301/298 "2010-12-03T17:32:15Z")
> [@Dinsdale](#): > > So if they don’t need anyone looking after their best interest, they will forego seeking assistance via bankruptcy, welfare, or any other public programs once they fuck themselves up? 😛 I think this mindset is the exact reason I vote Republican a majority of the time. The woe is "them’ rhetoric gets to me. ---
**Author:** ![Kearsen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/82dd89/32.png) [@Kearsen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kearsen)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-freezes-federal-worker-pay-for-2-years/562301/299 "2010-12-03T17:33:39Z")
> [@Jas09](#): > > You are the only person using the word stupid. If you can’t understand why a blue-collar worker working doubles with no money for a financial adviser and very little in the way of “disposable” income might have more difficulty planning for retirement than a white-collar office worker that has time to post on a message board during the day, then I don’t know what to tell you. Don’t be obtuse, of course he didn’t come out and SAY the words “too stupid” but that is exactly what he meant. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-freezes-federal-worker-pay-for-2-years/562301/300 "2010-12-03T17:35:10Z")
> [@Kearsen](#): > > When do people get to stand up and realize that they either succeed or fuck up ON THEIR OWN. Where is the personal responsibility? Sorry, I thought you were debating. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-freezes-federal-worker-pay-for-2-years/562301.md?page=14) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-freezes-federal-worker-pay-for-2-years/562301.md?page=16)