That was the message from the Federal Reserve chairman on Saturday to graduates of the University of South Carolina.
Or was it?
“We all know that getting a better-paying job is one of the main reasons to go to college. … But if you are ever tempted to go into a field or take a job only because the pay is high and for no other reason, be careful!” Ben Bernanke said in his commencement address.
“Having a larger income is exciting at first, but as you get used to your new standard of living and as you associate with other people in your new income bracket, the thrill quickly wears off,” he said.'
Unless you’re a Liberal that is…
If you’re rich, you’re above it all. But we will demonize only Republicans.
If you’re not, you are told you’re entitled to other people’s money, so don’t worry about it.
But doesn’t this sound a lot like Michelle Obama’s Zanesville speech that got her in so much hot water that she was removed from the campaign trail.
“The salaries don’t keep up with the cost of paying off the debt, so you’re in your 40s, still paying off your debt at a time when you have to save for your kids,” she says.
“Barack and I were in that position,” she continues. “The only reason we’re not in that position is that Barack wrote two best-selling books… It was like Jack and his magic beans. But up until a few years ago, we were struggling to figure out how we would save for our kids.” A former attorney with the white-shoe Chicago firm of Sidley & Austin, Obama explains that she and her husband made the choice to give up lucrative jobs in favor of community service. “We left corporate America, which is a lot of what we’re asking young people to do,” she tells the women. “Don’t go into corporate America. You know, become teachers. Work for the community. Be social workers. Be a nurse. Those are the careers that we need, and we’re encouraging our young people to do that. But if you make that choice, as we did, to move out of the money-making industry into the helping industry, then your salaries respond.” Faced with that reality, she adds, “many of our bright stars are going into corporate law or hedge-fund management.”
Collectively, according to the IRS, they made $5 Million Dollars last year.
I guess that wasn’t so evil.
The message, don’t strive so hard to succeed.
Lower your expectations.
Because, we already know we are living so far beyond our means as a government that eventually, in 10 or 20 years or less you’ll be Greece’d.
So better to lower the expectations now so they can lessen the violence when the fecal matter hits the air circulation device.
In Greece:
They are angry because for years they have been encouraged to live beyond their means, taking advantage of the cheap credit on offer since Greece joined the euro in 2001. Now, the rug is being pulled from under their feet. People who have taken out mortgages to buy homes, loans to purchase cars and credit cards to pay for overpriced basic goods are being asked to meet all these commitments with a much lower income than they had budgeted for.
Fannie and Freddie anyone??
UK Guardian: Saddled with burgeoning public sectors (which help sustain muscular trade unions)– SEIU, UAW, NEA anyone?
This is not what angers Greeks most, though. What you will hear time after time, both at the protests and at workplaces and cafes, is that this crisis confirms the failure of the country’s political system. In other words, that for years politicians have been bleeding the country dry, looking after themselves and their friends and failing to build a robust economy and a country equipped to deal with the challenges of the 21st century.
There is anger at the pervasive, high-level corruption for which no politician is ever punished. People are also furious that no government has ever tackled influence-peddling in the public sector. The Greek branch of Transparency International estimated that Greeks paid almost euro800 million ($1 billion) in bribes last year. This is another drain on household budgets but more importantly it creates a sense of injustice, a sense that to get anything done you have to play by the system’s warped rules.
Sound familiar??
This feeling of unfairness is compounded when tax evasion also goes unpunished.
“Turbo Tax” Geithner anyone? Barney Frank? Charlie Rangel??
Salaried professionals and civil servants have their wages taxed at source but many Greeks do not. And, what they declare often bears no resemblance to what they actually earn. The government believes that tax evasion could be worth up to euro30 billion ($38 billion) a year, or 12 percent of the country’s GDP. Allowing one part of the population to consistently get away without paying while Greece’s public finances are propped up by the same people all the time creates incredible resentment. That’s why you hear many Greeks say they will put up with the austerity measures if the government ensures that everybody pays their fair share. If people believe that the usual suspects, who in many cases are wealthy businessmen, doctors and lawyers, are allowed to get away with it, then the level of anger will go up several notches.
47% of all Americans pay NO TAXES whatsover!
Union workers and civil servant can make more in retirement than on the job.
But we aren’t going down that road…oh no…the Nazi, Racist, Violent Tea Baggers are just wrong.
Some of the measures imposed on Greece by the EU in order to bail them out (BBC):
The plans hope to achieve budget cuts of 30bn euros over three years – with the goal of cutting Greece’s public deficit to less than 3% of GDP by 2014. It currently stands at 13.6%.
PAY CUTS
The government is planning a freeze pay for all public sector workers.
Some pay cuts will also be implemented, and public sector contract workers are set to lose their jobs.
This follows several years of continuous increases in pay, with salaries rising by an average of 30% since 2006.
Annual bonus payments – paid as 13th and 14th month salaries – will also be scrapped for high earners and capped for lower earners.
Other bonuses will be scrapped.
In the private sector, the legal maximum number of people companies can lay off each month will be doubled from 2% of personnel to 4%.
PENSIONS
The reforms seek to prevent early retirement. Currently the average age of retirement in Greece is 61, though it is not uncommon for public sector workers to retire in their 50s.
Under the planned changes, the retirement age, which is currently 65 years for men and 60 years for women, will be linked to average life expectancy.
In addition, the minimum number of years someone will have had to have worked to qualify for a full pension will rise to 40 years from 37.
Pensions will also be reduced so that they reflect a worker’s average working pay rather than their final salary.
TAX REFORM
VAT will be increased to 23% from 21% – just the latest in a series of recent increases.
Indirect taxes – including those on alcohol, fuel and cigarettes – will see a 10% rise.
There will also be a clamp-down on tax evasion – widely regarded as a big problem in Greece – and on untaxed illegal construction.
Tax-evasion alone is estimated to cost the Greek government at least 20bn euros a year.
PRIVATISATION
In the longer-term, the government will look to reduce the reliance of the Greek economy on the public sector, reducing the number of people on the public payroll.
This will require growth in the private sector, and possible privatisation of some industries.
Getting eerily uncomfortable I hope.
See our future if Obama and The Democrats (and Republicans too) are not stopped.
According to a December report from the BLS, state and local government employers spent an average of $39.83 per hour worked ($26.24 for wages and $13.60 for benefits) for total employee compensation in September 2009. Total employer compensation costs for private industry workers averaged $27.49 per hour ($19.45 for wages and $8.05 for benefits), see chart above. In other words, government employees make 45% more on average than private sector employees.
According to an analysis by USAToday (thanks to Michael Jahr for the pointer), “The number of federal workers earning six-figure salaries has exploded during the recession, according to an analysis of federal salary data.” For example, the number of federal employees making $100,000 or more has increased by 120,595, from 262,163 employees in December 2007 to 382,758 in June 2009, for a 46% increase. The number of federal workers making $150,000 or more has more than doubled since the recession started, from about 30,000 to more than 66,000 (see chart above).
USA Today also reports that “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.” That’s a 168,900% increase!!
The Unemployment rate in the public sector is about 3%.
It’s been near 10% for a very long time in the real world.
And do the Democrats look concerned?
Do the Republicans?
Do they?
Josh Barro writes for the Manhattan Institute about the “Two Americas” and the “sharp difference between two classes of employees: those who work in the private sector and those who work for the government. Workers in the public sector have experienced a very different recession from those in the private sector.”
So is this Greece-ing the skids for what the government knows is coming if things don’t change?
I think so.
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