Media reports often miss the obvious
By
Rory Ryan-hcpress@cinci.rr.com
Before 2009 slips away, it seems only appropriate to offer a few thoughts on some end-of-year media reporting.
In some corners, there have been a few positive surprises. Mostly, though, there have been the typical disappointments. (e.g., the collective Obama coverage.)
When watching the “60 Minutes” program last Sunday on the show’s return to Clinton County, and in reading The Cincinnati Enquirer’s report on same, there were a few disappointments. The Enquirer reported that Clinton County has the third-highest unemployment rate (now fourth-highest) in Ohio. The former – and once proud – Grey Lady on Vine failed to mention that one could toss a stone from the southeast borders of Clinton County and it would land in the county with the highest unemployment rate in Ohio at the time of the newspaper’s report. (That county would be Highland, with a jobless rate more than 16 percent.)
It would seem to be at least noteworthy that Highland County has Ohio’s highest jobless rate, particularly since a high percentage of those job losses were related directly or indirectly to DHL and/or ABX Air layoffs. (I was told one Highland County commissioner attempted to point this out to the Enquirer, but they didn’t seem all that interested.)
And then I watched the “60 Minutes” episode Sunday night. The television reporter, Scott Pelley, perhaps, seemed startled to learn that a parent who had lost her job had life insurance – but no health insurance.
My personal background is such that I was initially startled by the fact that the reporter apparently was startled. It registered, with me, as a big ol’ Duh.
Asked why she has life insurance but no health insurance, the former DHL worker explained that she is more concerned about her daughter “having a roof over her head than I am about me. ...I can’t go without my life insurance. I don’t have health insurance because I can’t afford it.”
Pelley, at least acting surprised, then asked, with some incredulity, “You’re more concerned about your daughter’s future than your own health?”
“You know, I’m a single parent. And {my daughter} was 13. And if anything happens to me, what’s gonna happen to her?”
At that moment, I lost at least 60 Moments of my “60 Minutes” focus.
For much of my life, my parents had life insurance when they did not have medical insurance. Right now, I maintain a life insurance policy with Modern Woodmen that I like to believe is still valid. (I do know the premiums have always been paid on time!)
However, I do not have medical insurance. It is simply too expensive for many of us who have spent our lives working in the private sector. The fact that a national television reporter appears startled and in disbelief by what most folks I know simply take for granted tells me there is a bit of an elitist class separation in this nation.
In fact, I recall many years ago listening to a relatively wealthy (back when a million dollars was a million dollars) local businessman say he does not believe in buying life insurance. “It’s a very poor investment with little ROI (return on investment),” he said.
I was about 20 years old at the time. Roughly eight years later, my first child was born and I bought a life insurance policy that I still have. It’s what we in the private sector do. We can’t afford medical insurance, but we purchase life insurance. As George Bailey (or maybe it was his guardian angel, Clarence) would say, “We’re worth more dead than alive.”
The people I know would commend the Clinton County single mother for thinking of her daughter’s well-being before worrying about her own. And they wouldn’t be startled in the least to learn she had opted for life insurance – which is affordable – over medical insurance – which is not.
Now, let’s segue the “60 Minutes” story – which had to be a major embarrassment for Ohio’s senators and congressional representatives – with a recent USA Today report by Dennis Cauchon.
Cauchon recently reported the “number of federal workers earning six-figure salaries has exploded during the recession. Federal employees making salaries of $100,000 or more jumped from 14 percent to 19 percent of civil servants during the recession’s first 18 months – and that’s before overtime pay and bonuses are counted.”
So much for Obama’s promise of change.
“Federal workers are enjoying an extraordinary boom time – in pay and hiring – during a recession that has cost 7.3 million jobs in the private sector,” Cauchon writes. ...“The trend to six-figure salaries is occurring throughout the federal government, in agencies big and small, high-tech and low-tech. The primary cause: substantial pay raises and new salary rules.”
“There’s no way to justify this to the American people. It’s ridiculous,” says Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, a first-term lawmaker who is on the House’s federal workforce subcommittee. (And, yes, as one of our Alert Online Readers noted at www.highlandcountypress.com, Rep. Chaffetz also is in the six-figure income bracket.)
Cauchon points out that the recession-era pay hikes began under Bush, with the approval of the Democrat-controlled Congress. Congress approved across-the-board raises on already-high salaries of 3 percent in January 2008 and 3.9 percent in January 2009. President Obama has recommended 2-percent pay raises in January 2010. However, most federal workers also get longevity pay hikes – called step increases – that average 1.5 percent per year. (Of course, they don’t like to count the step increases. Those are entitlements, after all.)
Granted, the federal workers’ union, the American Federation of Government Employees, was quick to argue with the USA Today report. John Gage, the national AFGE president, said, “The fact is that when it comes to averages, federal employees as a whole are underpaid relative to their private sector counterparts in nearly all parts of the country.”
Not so fast, Mr. Gage.
The Free Enterprise Nation, a small voice for the private-sector employers and employees, reports these interesting tidbits:
• Federal civilian wages averaged $79,197 in 2008, more than 50 percent greater than that of the average private sector employee’s wages of $49,935.
• Pay in the public sector climbed 53.7 percent from 2000-08 for federal civilian workers while wages in the private sector rose just 28.5 percent over the same period.
• The U.S. government issued employee bonuses of some $370 million last year.
• The average state and local government employee earns 29 percent more than the average private-sector employee.
• More than 40 percent of city employees in Vallejo, Calif., had salaries greater than $100,000 in 2008. In May 2008, Vallejo filed for bankruptcy.
• When wages and benefits are combined, federal civilian workers averaged $119,982 in 2008, twice the amount of $59,909 which workers in the private sector averaged for wages/benefits.
• The value of benefits for federal civilian workers averaged $40,000 a year – four times the value of benefits that the average private- sector employee receives.
• The majority of public-sector workers have pension plans that allow them to retire 10 to 25 years earlier with benefits many times the retirement payout that Social Security would provide.
• More than 4,000 state employees are double-dipping in Arizona alone. (Ohio has more than its share, too.)
• The private sector lost 5.2 million workers while government grew by 238,000 workers between July 2008 and July 2009. Since the recession began in December 2007, private sector employment has declined 5.74 percent, while government payroll has grown 0.83 percent.
• The total public debt is now at $11.8 trillion. Interest payments alone on debt came to $452 billion in 2008.
• The Congressional Budget Office states that by next year America’s debt will exceed 60 percent of its Gross Domestic Product (GDP). In 2023, our debt will exceed 100 percent of the GDP.
• The unfunded liability for Social Security is $17.5 trillion in 2009.
As Mark Steyn puts it in a recent National Review column: “A snapshot of 21st century America would show a motivated, can-do small businessman working around the clock until he’s 78 to pay for a government worker who retires at 52 with a pension and benefits the private-sector schmuck could never dream of.”
Therein lies the crux of the matter: The private-sector workforce can no longer sustain the excesses of its myriad government expenses, the vast majority of which are tied to high salaries and costly benefits and pensions. When 84 cents of every $1 in expenses are needed for salaries and bennies, it’s no wonder government is broke.
Rory Ryan is publisher and editor of The Highland County Press.[[In-content Ad]]
In some corners, there have been a few positive surprises. Mostly, though, there have been the typical disappointments. (e.g., the collective Obama coverage.)
When watching the “60 Minutes” program last Sunday on the show’s return to Clinton County, and in reading The Cincinnati Enquirer’s report on same, there were a few disappointments. The Enquirer reported that Clinton County has the third-highest unemployment rate (now fourth-highest) in Ohio. The former – and once proud – Grey Lady on Vine failed to mention that one could toss a stone from the southeast borders of Clinton County and it would land in the county with the highest unemployment rate in Ohio at the time of the newspaper’s report. (That county would be Highland, with a jobless rate more than 16 percent.)
It would seem to be at least noteworthy that Highland County has Ohio’s highest jobless rate, particularly since a high percentage of those job losses were related directly or indirectly to DHL and/or ABX Air layoffs. (I was told one Highland County commissioner attempted to point this out to the Enquirer, but they didn’t seem all that interested.)
And then I watched the “60 Minutes” episode Sunday night. The television reporter, Scott Pelley, perhaps, seemed startled to learn that a parent who had lost her job had life insurance – but no health insurance.
My personal background is such that I was initially startled by the fact that the reporter apparently was startled. It registered, with me, as a big ol’ Duh.
Asked why she has life insurance but no health insurance, the former DHL worker explained that she is more concerned about her daughter “having a roof over her head than I am about me. ...I can’t go without my life insurance. I don’t have health insurance because I can’t afford it.”
Pelley, at least acting surprised, then asked, with some incredulity, “You’re more concerned about your daughter’s future than your own health?”
“You know, I’m a single parent. And {my daughter} was 13. And if anything happens to me, what’s gonna happen to her?”
At that moment, I lost at least 60 Moments of my “60 Minutes” focus.
For much of my life, my parents had life insurance when they did not have medical insurance. Right now, I maintain a life insurance policy with Modern Woodmen that I like to believe is still valid. (I do know the premiums have always been paid on time!)
However, I do not have medical insurance. It is simply too expensive for many of us who have spent our lives working in the private sector. The fact that a national television reporter appears startled and in disbelief by what most folks I know simply take for granted tells me there is a bit of an elitist class separation in this nation.
In fact, I recall many years ago listening to a relatively wealthy (back when a million dollars was a million dollars) local businessman say he does not believe in buying life insurance. “It’s a very poor investment with little ROI (return on investment),” he said.
I was about 20 years old at the time. Roughly eight years later, my first child was born and I bought a life insurance policy that I still have. It’s what we in the private sector do. We can’t afford medical insurance, but we purchase life insurance. As George Bailey (or maybe it was his guardian angel, Clarence) would say, “We’re worth more dead than alive.”
The people I know would commend the Clinton County single mother for thinking of her daughter’s well-being before worrying about her own. And they wouldn’t be startled in the least to learn she had opted for life insurance – which is affordable – over medical insurance – which is not.
Now, let’s segue the “60 Minutes” story – which had to be a major embarrassment for Ohio’s senators and congressional representatives – with a recent USA Today report by Dennis Cauchon.
Cauchon recently reported the “number of federal workers earning six-figure salaries has exploded during the recession. Federal employees making salaries of $100,000 or more jumped from 14 percent to 19 percent of civil servants during the recession’s first 18 months – and that’s before overtime pay and bonuses are counted.”
So much for Obama’s promise of change.
“Federal workers are enjoying an extraordinary boom time – in pay and hiring – during a recession that has cost 7.3 million jobs in the private sector,” Cauchon writes. ...“The trend to six-figure salaries is occurring throughout the federal government, in agencies big and small, high-tech and low-tech. The primary cause: substantial pay raises and new salary rules.”
“There’s no way to justify this to the American people. It’s ridiculous,” says Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, a first-term lawmaker who is on the House’s federal workforce subcommittee. (And, yes, as one of our Alert Online Readers noted at www.highlandcountypress.com, Rep. Chaffetz also is in the six-figure income bracket.)
Cauchon points out that the recession-era pay hikes began under Bush, with the approval of the Democrat-controlled Congress. Congress approved across-the-board raises on already-high salaries of 3 percent in January 2008 and 3.9 percent in January 2009. President Obama has recommended 2-percent pay raises in January 2010. However, most federal workers also get longevity pay hikes – called step increases – that average 1.5 percent per year. (Of course, they don’t like to count the step increases. Those are entitlements, after all.)
Granted, the federal workers’ union, the American Federation of Government Employees, was quick to argue with the USA Today report. John Gage, the national AFGE president, said, “The fact is that when it comes to averages, federal employees as a whole are underpaid relative to their private sector counterparts in nearly all parts of the country.”
Not so fast, Mr. Gage.
The Free Enterprise Nation, a small voice for the private-sector employers and employees, reports these interesting tidbits:
• Federal civilian wages averaged $79,197 in 2008, more than 50 percent greater than that of the average private sector employee’s wages of $49,935.
• Pay in the public sector climbed 53.7 percent from 2000-08 for federal civilian workers while wages in the private sector rose just 28.5 percent over the same period.
• The U.S. government issued employee bonuses of some $370 million last year.
• The average state and local government employee earns 29 percent more than the average private-sector employee.
• More than 40 percent of city employees in Vallejo, Calif., had salaries greater than $100,000 in 2008. In May 2008, Vallejo filed for bankruptcy.
• When wages and benefits are combined, federal civilian workers averaged $119,982 in 2008, twice the amount of $59,909 which workers in the private sector averaged for wages/benefits.
• The value of benefits for federal civilian workers averaged $40,000 a year – four times the value of benefits that the average private- sector employee receives.
• The majority of public-sector workers have pension plans that allow them to retire 10 to 25 years earlier with benefits many times the retirement payout that Social Security would provide.
• More than 4,000 state employees are double-dipping in Arizona alone. (Ohio has more than its share, too.)
• The private sector lost 5.2 million workers while government grew by 238,000 workers between July 2008 and July 2009. Since the recession began in December 2007, private sector employment has declined 5.74 percent, while government payroll has grown 0.83 percent.
• The total public debt is now at $11.8 trillion. Interest payments alone on debt came to $452 billion in 2008.
• The Congressional Budget Office states that by next year America’s debt will exceed 60 percent of its Gross Domestic Product (GDP). In 2023, our debt will exceed 100 percent of the GDP.
• The unfunded liability for Social Security is $17.5 trillion in 2009.
As Mark Steyn puts it in a recent National Review column: “A snapshot of 21st century America would show a motivated, can-do small businessman working around the clock until he’s 78 to pay for a government worker who retires at 52 with a pension and benefits the private-sector schmuck could never dream of.”
Therein lies the crux of the matter: The private-sector workforce can no longer sustain the excesses of its myriad government expenses, the vast majority of which are tied to high salaries and costly benefits and pensions. When 84 cents of every $1 in expenses are needed for salaries and bennies, it’s no wonder government is broke.
Rory Ryan is publisher and editor of The Highland County Press.[[In-content Ad]]