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an instance when congress will come together.
an instance when congress will come together.
UGH that woman sucks. Not in a good way either.
Well, she is so rich, she can make up the difference for those poor staffers and reps that she is worried about.
Thanks. Parts of me just completely disappeared.
I guess she does suck in the best way possible for her. Any other way would be far FAR worse.
I would say GFY, but... well... parts of you completely disappeared.
No law, varying the compensation for the services of the Senators and Representatives, shall take effect, until an election of Representatives shall have intervened.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twenty-...s_Cons ution
Not the Congress would let the Cons ution trump their political games and ideology.
LOL stupid c*nt
Still, what about poor Representative Duffy who struggles to pay his bills on $174,000 a year
easy for her to say
If she's worried about the dignity of the job, she's more than welcome to step down and make someone else the house minority leader while leaving congress.
The House voted Friday to extend a pay freeze for federal workers, already in effect for more than two years, for another nine months.
Republicans, who largely backed the measure, said it would save $11 billion in the long run and that economically secure public servants could go a little longer without a raise.
Most Democrats, and the White House, criticized the bill as an example of anti-government bias and said Republicans, instead of debating a bill that has little chance of advancing in the Democratic-controlled Senate, should be concentrating on avoiding the pending automatic cuts to federal programs that could have a painful effect on the economy.
The House measure, approved on a 261-154 vote, blocks an executive order issued by President Barack Obama last December that would give the nation's 2 million civilian federal workers a 0.5 percent cost-of-living raise from March 27, when the current federal spending agreement expires, through the end of the year.
The White House has indicated it will also include a 1 percent federal pay increase in its 2014 budget proposal.
The White House, in a statement, opposed the House bill, saying federal workers have already done more than their part in bringing down the deficit and that the legislation was added burden on those who " assure the safety of this country's food and airways, defend the homeland, provide health care to the nation's veterans, search for cures to devastating diseases and provide vital support to our troops at home and abroad."
Obama in 2010 initiated a two-year freeze on federal COLAs as part of an effort to reduce the deficit. Federal worker unions and others opposing the bill say that, with the freeze and higher pension contributions required of new workers, federal employees are already helping save $103 billion over a 10-year period.
But the bill's sponsor, freshman Rep. Ron DeSantis, R-Fla., said his "modest" bill "simply recognizes our current fiscal reality and the fact that government salaries must bear some relationship to the private sector salaries that support them." His bill, estimated at saving $11 billion over 10 years, would also extend the freeze on congressional member pay, now running through September, until the end of the year.
The freeze only applies to cost-of-living adjustments, and not merit and longevity raises. The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee cited figures showing that, with merit-based raises and other "step" increases, the median pay for a federal employee in September last year was $72,714, up more than $3,000 from two years earlier. Committee Chairman Darrell Issa, R-Calif., said the pay freeze would cost each employee $274 for the year.
Those supporting the freeze say the average federal worker compensation, including benefits, is nearly double the median U.S. household income. They point to a 2012 Congressional Budget Office study showing that, while wages are similar for federal workers and comparable private sector workers, federal workers on the whole had more generous benefit packages. Overall, it said, total compensation is 16 percent higher in the public sector.
But federal worker unions rely on Bureau of Labor Statistics surveys showing that in most localities federal employees trail behind private sector counterparts in wages. This is most evident for more highly educated employees who give up lucrative opportunities in the private sector to serve the public.
National Treasury Employees Union president Colleen M. Kelley said the House bill was "a particularly galling step in light of the fact that federal workers have contributed far more than any other group to economic recovery and deficit reduction."
Opponents warned that government workers will also be the first to be hit if Congress fails to find a way to avert $85 billion in automatic spending cuts to occur at the end of this month or come up with a new spending plan when the current law covering federal spending expires at the end of March. "The salary freeze, along with the threat of furloughs, layoffs and another complete government shutdown, are a punishment in search of a crime," said American Federal of Government Employees national president J. David Cox.
One of the harshest critics of the bill was Republican Frank Wolf, whose northern Virginia district includes many federal workers. "This bill is nothing more than a political stunt that targets the hardworking, dedicated men and women of the civil service," he said in a letter to his GOP colleagues, reminding them that people who haven't seen a raise in more than two years include CIA and FBI agents, border and customs agents, nurses and doctors at VA facilities, food inspectors, firefighters at national forests and NASA astronauts and engineers.
According to the Office of Personnel Management, there were about 2.1 million civilian workers in 2011. The number has been consistently around the 2 million mark for the past 50 years.
http://mobile.sfgate.com/sfchron/db_...l=true#display
But Congress won't reduce their own pay or pensions.
Just heard this in TPR that had tpj.org guy on:
Judge: Totals spent on pensions of former lawmaker-lobbyists remains secret
Texas taxpayers cannot find out how much retired lawmakers as a group are collecting in retirement benefits from the state, an Austin judge ruled this morning.
The reason: Lawmakers have passed laws to keep that information secret, even if the retirees are not identified individually.
The decision by State District Judge Lora Livingston came in a lawsuit filed by the government-watchdog group Texans for Public Justice. The group is seeking to find out the total cost of retirement benefits being paid to 103 former
lawmakers who are now lobbiysts.
“The information is confidential,” Livingston said, citing a series of state laws passed over the past decade that have tightened the information on lawmakers’ pension benefits. Now, even aggregate information and ulative information about how much is being spent cannot be made public.
“One hundred and three is too narrow a class to provide (privacy) protection,” she said.
Livingston said that under current law, the state Employees Retirement System can make the decision about what information to make public. In court filings, they assert that the information is confidential.
Craig McDonald, executive director of the watchdog group, called the decision “absolutely outrageous.” He said the group is considering an appeal.
“It’s outrageous that the Legislature can hide the cost of its pensions from the taxpayers, the people who are paying for them,” he said.
In the past year, pensions paid to Texas’ so-called “elected class” of public officials have become an increasing point of public interest, ever since it was revealed during the 2012 GOP presidential primary that Gov. Rick Perry had officially “retired” and had begun collecting a state pension, even as he continued serving as governor and collecting his $150,000 a year salary.
Regular state employees are not allowed to do that, officials have said.
McDonald said the group asked Comptroller Susan Combs for the total pension amount paid to the 103 former lawmakers who are now lobbyists, noting that Texas has more “revolving-door” lawmakers than any other state.
Ex-lawmakers are among Texas’ highest paid lobbyists, he said. Over the past three years, the revolving-door legislators listed in the group’s information request to Combs reported in disclosure filings with the Texas Ethics Commission that their combined lobby incomes ranged from $53 million up to $105 million — 11 percent of all the lobby expenditures in the state.
According to court filings, Combs said the total amount spent was held by the retirement system. The retirement system refused to make it public, citing state law keeping any details confidential.
The same aggregate information was made public during the 1990s, before the Legislature changed state laws to keep the data secret.
During today’s court hearing, attorney Philip Durst, representing the watchdog group, argued that the confidentiality provisions of state law cover only information that could identify individuals — not aggregate amounts that would give taxpayers an idea of how much all of the former lawmakers were being paid by the state, as a group.
Assistant Attorney General Joshua Godbey said that by releasing the aggregate data on the group of 103 former lawmakers, that they might somehow be identified. In addition, he said state law is clear — that the information cannot be made public.
“The Legislature has put the sole discretion with ERS as to whether to release this information,” he said, noting they had said no.
Durst countered: “This is a fiscal line-item request. How public money is spent is at the heart of this request.”
Livingston said that although she understood the interest of the public in knowing how tax money is being spent, she had no choice. State law is clear, she said.
“I’m torn between the the public’s right to have the information and the privacy rights of the individuals,” she said. “That balancing act is always a difficult one.”
At one point, she noted she was familiar with the retirement system, having just recently received a statement detailing her current retirement amount.
http://www.statesman.com/news/news/s...Q5/#cmComments
The TPJ guy said on TPR that TX legislature had tied their pension to those of TX judges, and then raise the salaries and pensions of the TX judges.
^ yet another example of boutons constantly improving and perfecting the art of copy pasta deflection from Blue Team
To be fair, (I can't believe I'm agreeing with boutons 2x in one day
I skipped over the second article. Oops!
That would be undignified
ummmmm.....well played??
Pelosi sucks...
I'm not going to read the article but I'll just say she's not entirely wrong. We live in a society where we mark importance by how someone gets paid. Yet, we love to pay lip service to public servants without paying them whether they be soldiers, teachers, or government workers. We typically don't put our money where our mouth is regarding this situation. You can liken it quite a bit to how many of the brightest minds flocked to Wall Street when thats where the money was. So before you dismiss the concept of dignity and paychecks being tied together maybe give some thought to why we have who we do in office.
I'll put the concept of dignity and paychecks tied together after the concept of getting paid for doing actual work. These ers are half the year in recess while their 'staff' do all the work, then when they actually show up, they get nothing done. If Congress would be a private sector company, 3/4 of these s (or more) would've been fired already.
I completely agree, except for one thing.
During "recess," they are suppose to be in their home offices, and available for cons uents. Seems only the rich ones get appointments though.
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