For feds, more get 6-figure salaries

[kelvin070]

It's a bit much isn't it? Doesn't the President of the United States get paid only something like $450,000 a year?

I know most MP's here get paid only $130,000 a year, excluding allowances.

If you pay peanuts you get monkeys. The real good leaders are all in the private sector. So you got to dangle the carrots if you want them to serve the nation.

 

[kelvin070]

Bush was earning peanuts compared to CEOs.

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[Accountable]

If you pay peanuts you get monkeys. The real good leaders are all in the private sector. So you got to dangle the carrots if you want them to serve the nation.

I like that line. I hadn't heard it before.

So you're suggesting that we should pay our president an equivalent salary to your mayor? Using a ratio using population that would be about $125 million; using GDP it would be $156 million. Call me old-fashioned but I'd rather have a person serve for love of country. Of course all those guys are squeezed out by those running on loyalty to party.

 

[kelvin070]

I like that line. I hadn't heard it before.

So you're suggesting that we should pay our president an equivalent salary to your mayor? Using a ratio using population that would be about $125 million; using GDP it would be $156 million. Call me old-fashioned but I'd rather have a person serve for love of country. Of course all those guys are squeezed out by those running on loyalty to party.

There must be some kind of benchmark. Minister's salaries here are pegged to what the top professionals in the private sector earns.

 

[Accountable]

There must be some kind of benchmark. Minister's salaries here are pegged to what the top professionals in the private sector earns.

How is that determined? Over here Obama & company have decided that they should have control over corporate executive salaries.

 

[kelvin070]

How is that determined? Over here Obama & company have decided that they should have control over corporate executive salaries.

The salary is determined based on the after tax income of six highest salaries of private sector professionals. Can't blame Obama cuz banks were using bailout money to pay generous bonuses.

 

[Tim]

It's funny that people argue that the president of the United States should not earn more than what he is already making because he should be doing it for "love of country" Yet they are the same people that have a problem with limiting CEO's salaries because they think it will attract the "best" people for the job.
How can you argue one and not the other? Shouldn't you have the same stance for both? Wouldn't you want the absolutely brightest people fighting to become president? We are not talking about a few million in corporations profits here, we are talking about trillions in taxes, your taxes. If we had the best in business vying for the presidency, wouldn't we do much better economically as a country? What would it mean if we could dramatically increase our GDP or cut governmental spending across the board while making it more efficient? Would that be worth $200million a year in salary to the president?

 

[Kyle B]

It's funny that people argue that the president of the United States should not earn more than what he is already making because he should be doing it for "love of country" Yet they are the same people that have a problem with limiting CEO's salaries because they think it will attract the "best" people for the job.
How can you argue one and not the other? Shouldn't you have the same stance for both? Wouldn't you want the absolutely brightest people fighting to become president? We are not talking about a few million in corporations profits here, we are talking about trillions in taxes, your taxes. If we had the best in business vying for the presidency, wouldn't we do much better economically as a country? What would it mean if we could dramatically increase our GDP or cut governmental spending across the board while making it more efficient? Would that be worth $200million a year in salary to the president?

If we raised the salary of the presidency to $200 million, how would that at all guarantee that smarter and more competent people would be vying for the job? We would just have a much larger pool of applicants from different sectors. Sure, a lot of them will be very smart, but we'll probably still get a whole bunch of incompetent people as well, just as we have now. Furthermore, we'd be more likely to get a President who's more interested in the money than actually improving the country.

Also, just because a businessman may know how to run a business, doesn't mean he knows how to run a country. A businessman might be smart when it comes to compiling the budget and administrating, but what about all the other aspects of the presidency? He'd have to decide when to wage war, how to combat terrorism, what foreign policy path to pursue, how to cooperate with the other branches of government, and how to interact with the American people. Politicians most likely have a better idea of how to accomplish those tasks than business people.

 

[Accountable]

The salary is determined based on the after tax income of six highest salaries of private sector professionals. Can't blame Obama cuz banks were using bailout money to pay generous bonuses.

The banks were using money given to them by the federal government (an illegal act, I'm betting) with no strings. They used the money to obey the legal contracts that bound them. Doesn't matter how stupid, unfair, wasteful, or anything else it was. The money shouldn't have been given in the first place; the companies had no option to ignore their contractual obligations.

 

[Accountable]

It's funny that people argue that the president of the United States should not earn more than what he is already making because he should be doing it for "love of country" Yet they are the same people that have a problem with limiting CEO's salaries because they think it will attract the "best" people for the job.
How can you argue one and not the other? Shouldn't you have the same stance for both? Wouldn't you want the absolutely brightest people fighting to become president? We are not talking about a few million in corporations profits here, we are talking about trillions in taxes, your taxes. If we had the best in business vying for the presidency, wouldn't we do much better economically as a country? What would it mean if we could dramatically increase our GDP or cut governmental spending across the board while making it more efficient? Would that be worth $200million a year in salary to the president?

I don't hold a stake in most of the corporations. For those that I do own a stake in (shares of stock) I generally vote against the highest salaries and golden parachutes. I definitely hold a stake in the nation. The government is broke. If we were operating in the black I likely wouldn't have a problem paying higher salaries, but we simply can't afford it. There hasn't been a president who didn't fuck up the economy since Clinton, and not one who supported and defended the Constitution (their number 1 duty) since before Lincoln. Why should I support paying anyone for not doing their job??
If our reps in Washington did their jobs, the government would be a small fraction of its current size with a comparatively infinitesimal budget. That would be worth billions to me.

 

[nova]

It's funny that people argue that the president of the United States should not earn more than what he is already making because he should be doing it for "love of country" Yet they are the same people that have a problem with limiting CEO's salaries because they think it will attract the "best" people for the job.
How can you argue one and not the other? Shouldn't you have the same stance for both? Wouldn't you want the absolutely brightest people fighting to become president? We are not talking about a few million in corporations profits here, we are talking about trillions in taxes, your taxes. If we had the best in business vying for the presidency, wouldn't we do much better economically as a country? What would it mean if we could dramatically increase our GDP or cut governmental spending across the board while making it more efficient? Would that be worth $200million a year in salary to the president?

Good plan except the level of pay has nary a thing to do with who actually gets elected.

Yes, you might entice more competent people to run, but those competent people could never get elected because the American people would rather be lied to than hear the hard truth that no they can't have their cake and eat it too.

Hell, if competence and good ideas had anything to do with the who gets elected, I dare say Ron Paul would be the current resident of 1600 PA Ave....

 

[BadBoy@TheWheel]

Question Tim....Should the authority to give pay raises at the federal level....Be given to those who will benefit...At the Federal level?

My CEO has never arbitrarily said "Board....I just gave myself a 3% raise.....Oh and lifetime medical benefits that you can't have.....Oh and a break while the markets are collapsing around us....."

Civil SERVANTS...Notice the word SERVANT they work for us....Shouldn't we decide?