Federal workers, who have been immune to the hardships and layoffs that besiege the private sector, are worried that looming budget cuts may result in reduced paychecks come March 1st.
Federal furloughs seem more and more likely as a disgusted nation and frustrated workers count down the days until March 1, when across-the-board budget cuts known as sequestration kick in.
Furloughs would not be immediate; agencies must give employees 30 days’ notice. But the impact could be severe. The Pentagon estimates that most of its 800,000 civilian employees could lose up to 20 percent of their pay from 22 furlough days, spread over as many weeks. Estimates from other agencies are lower, and some might be able to deal with the budget cuts with no furloughs at all.
“I have never seen anything like this,” said Watkins, who has been a federal employee for 28 years. “Never expected anything like this. I gather people don’t understand what government employees do. Many of us do this because we want to serve. They don’t seem to understand that.”
With a husband who has a good income, Laura Hill, a Defense Department employee from Annandale, is more fortunate than some colleagues. In fact, if furlough days are imposed, “having a day of ‘me time’ would not be a bad thing for me during the week,” said the mother of a 7-month-old boy.
Federal workers are not likely to get much sympathy from private sector workers who earn half as much and have endured pay reductions, reduced hours and higher deductions for medical insurance. According to Jeffrey Gundlach, bond fund manager, federal workers lead a privileged life, earning double what their comparable positions in private industry pay.
Then Jeffrey pulls the slide out that Ron Paul has probably had made into a bedspread so he can wrap himself in it nice and snug each night at bedtime – the one showing how federal employees now make double what private sector employees make (largely thanks to pension and retirement benefits that “have got to be cut. Benefits will be slashed.” He notes that federal employees are not payers of taxes, they are “receivers of tax dollars.”
The President constantly lectures us on “sharing the wealth.” Bringing public employee pay into line with what private sector employees make would be a good start.
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