A group of New York policemen followed Mayor DeBlasio to Iowa — where DeBlasio was spreading his Progressive message — and demonstrated against him. The wanted to show the Iowans that DeBlasio wasn’t a real Progressive – he didn’t give the cops a raise in over three years – that’s no Progressive.
Never mind that when DeBlasio took office he gave the cops, the teachers, and many other civil servants basically everything they wanted – after around 15 years of no contracts under Mayors Giuliani and Bloomberg, who wouldn’t give into the unreasonable demands of the unions, at the expense and the well-being of the City. Now policemen start making over $100,000 a year, which includes benefits (which is never included when cops complain they are making too little for “risking their lives every day”).
Consider the math: Cops start at around $35,000 a year, go up to around $50,000 after 5 years, and often retire at over $80,000 a year. They get half their income in retirement after 20 years. This amounts to $40,000 a year. If they live the average male life span of 75 years, they will collect around $1.2 million ($40,000 times 30 years). Divide the 20 years they worked into $1.2 million, and their retirement benefits are at least $60,000 a year. This totals starting at $95,000 and ending at $140,000 a year.
This doesn’t include health care, including dental care, for them and their spouses for life and 2/3 their yearly income in retirement if they claim disability at any time after their retirement, which many of them do. (1)
Meanwhile New York taxpayers work their tails off to pay these salaries, but the cops want more….and more. And don’t dare complain, they will have a slowdown in law enforcement and you will be called “anti-cop.”
Welcome to the public employment con, where public employees make around 25% more that private employees, who pay their salaries.
Rikers Closing
DeBlasio is planning to close Rikers Island jail that houses around 5,000 prisoners, many of them young men who have short terms or who are awaiting trial. He plans to spread them out in various neighborhoods. Another kick in the groin to taxpayers who work hard and obey the laws.
Correction officer pay
Correction officers get approximately the same benefits as policemen. They can retire after 20 years and get half of their average salaries in their last five years. The starting salaries for these correction officers is around $30,000 a year plus benefits. After 20 years the salary is around $80,000 a year. This means that at age around 40, they can receive $40,000 a year for life, plus health benefits. Like the policemen, if they retire at age 40 and live to be 75, this amounts to around $1.4 million in retirement benefits, plus their Social Security. They are literal millionaires (to receive $40,000 a year in secure investments, getting, say, 3% interest, they would have to have $1.3 million invested).
Every time there is a violent episode at Riker’s, many officers claim disabilities, where they can retire early and collect an increase in retirement benefits.
Foremen on the Long Island Railroad
There was a recent disclosure showing the absurd salaries of LIRR foremen’s, due largely to overtime.
(It must be noted that there is little incentive to save money in most public employment, from the lowest worker to the highest political office, including the Governor and the President. The general philosophy is “just raise taxes” and “deficits don’t matter.”)
The article in the New York Post list four foremen who were making over $400,000 a year, due to around $200,000 salary and $200,000 overtime. If the retire at 50% income level, this means that they could receive $200,000 a year retirement benefits for life, plus heath benefits. The are literal mult-millionaires.(2) (To receive $200,000 a year in private investments, one would need over $6 million in secure investments which earned 3% interest. If the foreman lived 30 years after retirement, he would receive $6 million from taxpayers, plus health benefits and Social Security.) Thank-you suckers.
The reason some public employees make so much income from taxpayers is simply because they have well-organized unions with heavy political clout. Most ordinary workers stand alone to compete in the free enterprise economy.
(1) Most disabilities that develop after retirement can be considered “duty related,” especially “stress from duty related.”
(2) Also, see the article, Farina Retires.
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I didn’t know cops get these kinds of benefits..meanwhile, us taxpayers, private employees work as much hard maybe even harder.
Totally right. I mean, here we are working our tails off, while these guys get way beyond what we do.
Davina,
My point exactly. And all because they are organized, and that there is not motivation for cutting costs in the government. This is not to add affirmative action and diversity in public employment — not the best person for the job. Also, after President Reagan, pension plans for private employees went out the window, but public employees still often get good pension plans.
What what can you do? We all can’t work for the government.
RG
I think that it’s good that we start talking about these. It’s good that we have guys like you who educate us on these issues and keeping us informed. I guess that’s the first thing you can do, start talking about the issue and educating people and having a discussion.
“Welcome to the public employment con, where public employees make around 25% more that private employees, who pay their salaries.”
–That right there shows what inequality is.
Rachel,
Good insight. This inequality is also seen when both public and private workers retire. Public employees often have good retirements benefits (paid by the private workers) and often the private retirees can’t even afford their medication.
Meanwhile, this low-paying private worker, who has worked her entire life, sees people who have never worked and ex-cons living a better lifestyle, with free housing, Medicaid (which pays everything), and disability benefits. We are calling her the “white sucker.” Then this “deplorable” person votes for Donald Trump…….and gets screwed again. Meanwhile, she is demeaned by the black con as being part of the “white supremacy.”
RG