(And there are fifty-five more clips from the past week in politics over at Hominid Views.)
Can’t Bring Yourself to Type the Word “Ass”?
Eager to share our brilliant political commentary and blunt media criticism, but too genteel to link to horsesass.org? Well, good news, ladies: we also answer to HASeattle.com, because, you know, whatever. You're welcome!
I see the irresponsible tax-and-spend city council in the liberal bastion of Bellevue has a budget shortfall. Of course, this sort of thing never happens where Republicans are in charge.
http://seattletimes.nwsource.c.....udget.html
And, needless to say, the Seattle Times’ Kate Riley is up-in-arms about the state senate overriding I-960 to raise taxes instead of breaking union contracts and cutting worker pay.
http://seattletimes.nwsource.c.....ate12.html
Question: How much of her pay did she give up when her employer was teetering on the brink so her boss wouldn’t have to go panhandling in Olympia for a tax break?
Roger Rabbit won’t be posting today. I’ll be busy all day. I’m taking a Fort Lewis soldier headed for the war zone to a pre-deployment luncheon.
Where is that idiot Klynical??
i see he hasn’t posted any poll numbers lately.
that means president obama is doing much, much better. as a public service to klynical and all the resident wingnuts, i’ll do the posting today.
Saturday, February 13, 2010 Email to a Friend ShareThis.Advertisement
The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Friday shows that 24% of the nation’s voters Strongly Approve of the way that Barack Obama is performing his role as President. Forty-one percent (41%) Strongly Disapprove giving Obama a Presidential Approval Index rating of -17.
Overall, 45% of voters say they at least somewhat approve of the President’s performance. Fifty-three percent (53%) disapprove.
Heard Dori “We shouldn’t have to pay one thin dime in taxes” Monson lying on the radio yesterday regarding the proposed sales tax increase. Now as anyone with half a brain knows, sales taxes are regressive but Dori made the claim that he is paying 50% taxes. Uhhh…No. Even the lowest of incomes in Washington, those with the highest % of income going to sales taxes and federal taxes, aren’t even close to that.
then he agreed with a caller who claimed that the tax increase would take $13,000 from his profits. Really? You plan on lowering your prices 1% to avoid the consumer paying the tax? Monson, of course, didn’t go into the possibility equal net sales means no decrease in the businesses profitability. That wouldn’t fit his narrative. Just, “Wow, that means you’ll need to increase sales by $13,000 just to break even.” Uhhhh…no. If the business had a net of say $250,000 in 2009 and a net of say $250,000 in 2010 there is no change. But his customers will pay an extra $2,500 in sales tax. Any loss is speculative based on a “feeling” about decreased sales by “saving” consumers.
Not that I think a sales tax increase is in any way appropriate.
I suspect the wingnuts will likely point out that State employees on average have wages 70% higher than private employees, double the paid benefits and double the paid time-off on average. We have to avoid this conversation, even though it is true. Governor Gregoire has done a great job for us state union workers. We must have more tax dollars to support us.
@6
This smells like a talking point. “Don’t check the facts Ma’am.”
Can you cite a source? I’d like to see proof that a private sector employee, say an office manager @ 30K compared to a state office manager that makes 51k. Or any essentially identical jobs that pay 70% more as a state employee.
And if public employees were Unionized by and large, the chipping away of vacation time over the last three decades wouldn’t have happened. It’s all part of the sheep following the mantra of, “It doesn’t matter how crappy I’m treated or that my workload has tripled with no compensation. Productivity is up. The shareholders are happy. At least I have a job.”
What happened to the righty mantra of higher salaries and benefits are REQUIRED to attract top talent. Oh, right. that only applies to the executive suite.
Once again Herr Goebbels Himmler Dumb Bunny makes a useless association to Republicans@1 like he tried with the child molester late last week.
Another EPIC FAIL! Butt Puddy doesn’t need to dedicate personal hard drive space to keep a HA backup locally like ylb arschloch does… Google works just fine. Butt of course you need to remember comments from leftist progressives.
Thor told us in 2006 “One reason the entire eastside is becoming Blue is because Freeman has insisted all the Red guys and gals see things his way.”
Goldy told us in 2006 “But Seattle is not just a dark blue island in the midst of a sea of red, for over the past decade the nearby suburbs have grown solidly Democratic too. Republican elected officials are becoming a dying breed in former GOP strongholds like Mercer Island, Bellevue and other communities across the Eastside and to both the North and the South of the city.”
headless AKA The Centrist told us “I’m one of those latte-sipping elitists from the east side.”
Eli Saunders of the stranger thought east siders would make Darcy’s day.
So much for another of the Dumb Bunny’s rants just like his Tye Christopher Moore fart.
this is what makes me laugh about our socially engineered society.
crack is mostly used by minorities, but there is a commercial by a drug free america orginization that shows an african american mom walking into a crackhouse to try to get info to be able to talk to her kids. but guess what our sorry ass society thats afraid to admit to truths does? are any of the crack users in the house minority? no, they’re all white. we do so much manipulation of facts that we deserve the future we are going to get.
@6
Are Federal Workers Overpaid?
http://economix.blogs.nytimes......-overpaid/
Private vs. Public Sector Pay
http://economix.blogs.nytimes......or-pay/?hp
Yeah, a hundred and fifty MEGAbytes..
Such a terrible burden.
@10
Irrelevence on alert. So you make a generalization about Washington state and then you give me a chart on Federal? You don’t suppose that lots of states with a manufacturing or agricultural base skews the chart? If the majority of jobs in Kansas are low wage agricultural while the number of high-wage professional jobs are few and tend to be public, that clouds the data.
And even giving you the private industry vs. public sector (rounded 27.5K to 40K) the private sector employee makes 70% of a public. So even by your own chart, a public employee makes 30% more, mostly in benefits as opposed to wages, than a private sector. Even your evidence proves you wrong. (“State employees on average have wages 70% higher than private employees…”)
Want to try again? There’s no shame in admitting you were wrong.
@12 And even giving you the private industry vs. public sector (rounded 27.5K to 40K) the private sector employee makes 70% of a public. So even by your own chart, a public employee makes 30% more, mostly in benefits as opposed to wages, than a private sector.
You are math challenged, you dope. Here’s what the chart says based on Sept 09 BLS data:
Private industry:
Benefits: $8.05 (an hour)
Wages: $19.45
Total: $27.5
State and local government:
Benefits: $13.60 (68.94% greater than private)
Wages: $26.24 (34.91% greater)
Total: $39.84 (44.87% greater)
Even your evidence proves you wrong. (”State employees on average have wages 70% higher than private employees…”)
That’s not my claim, you dope. And regarding this math gem:
the private sector employee makes 70% of a public. So even by your own chart, a public employee makes 30% more mostly in benefits as opposed to wages
If X is P percent of Y, it DOES NOT follow that Y is (100-P) percent of X.
In one hour our average government employee – who makes $12.34 or 44.87% more overall, NOT 30% – will earn:
* $5.55 more in Benefits than the average private sector employee
* $6.79 more in Wages than the average private sector employee
SO 44.98 percent of our average government employee’s hourly $12.34 Benefits+Wages advantage is due to Benefits, and 55.02 percent to Wages, CONTRARY to your “analysis”:
mostly in benefits as opposed to wages
Wow Jon. You’re amazing. “That’s not my claim.” Uhhh…It was quoted directly from you. ”State employees on average have wages 70% higher than private employees…” See that. WAGES ,HGHER ,70%. That was your claim.
Look carefully at the charts you linked. They indicate the total value of the compensation package for the average private sector employee (that includes benefits) at 27.5k. It puts the total compensation package of the average government employee at 40k.
I did the math. Accurately. 27.5k is 70% of 40k. But let’s go back to your original quote that only described wages. 19k for private, 26k for government (rounded again.) 19k is 73% of 40k. So in your purely wage based argument, the average government employee makes 27% more.
And in your backtracking you want to now claim that the total is 44.87% higher for government than private. So where’s the 70% you spouted off in your first post.
You said it. Not me. Done.
“If X is P percent of Y, it DOES NOT follow that Y is (100-P) percent of X.” (That’s stupid. You have a value x that you state is a % of Y and then claim that Y is not 100% of X. Of course not, x is a % of Y so it is impossible for Y to be 100% of x unless the value of Y and X are identical. Logic! You were trying to appear smarter than you are, weren’t you?)
Sorry, but that doesn’t wash among intelligent people. You spouted BS (“State employees on average have wages 70% higher than private employees…”) and got caught. DEAL!
Wow Jon. You’re amazing. “That’s not my claim.” Uhhh…It was quoted directly from you. ”State employees on average have wages 70% higher than private employees…” See that. WAGES HGHER 70%. That was you’re claim.
Read carefully – that’s from a Jonathan, you dope!
I did the math. Accurately. 27.5k is 70% of 40k. But let’s go back to your original quote that only described wages. 19k for private, 26k for government (rounded again.) 19k is 73% of 40k. So in your purely wage based argument, the average government employee makes 27% more.
Here’s what you wrote @12:
And even giving you the private industry vs. public sector (rounded 27.5K to 40K) the private sector employee makes 70% of a public. So even by your own chart, a public employee makes 30% more, mostly in benefits as opposed to wages
You’re CLEARLY referring to wages + benefits. And you got the 30% using the math-challenged reasoning: “if a private sector employee makes 70% of a public employee, a public employee makes 30% more.”
So when you come up with this @14:
But let’s go back to your original quote that only described wages. 19k for private, 26k for government (rounded again.) 19k is 73% of 40k. So in your purely wage based argument, the average government employee makes 27% more.
I bet you’d like to find new numbers. But you weren’t referring to just wages when you came up with the 30% – you were clearly referring to wages + benefits. And just to confirm how severely math challenged you are: 26K is 36.84% greater than 19K, not 27%.
You’re using the same inane math reasoning as you did @12, you dope!
You’re right. I see the error in my argument. But why give me federal charts when talking about state workers? And why, when calling BS on the 70% claim did you provide evidence and argue that 45% is 70%? (Or 36.84% is 70%)
I should have noticed that Jon and Johnathan were not the same person but when someone named Jon posts links to rebut a comment made to Johnathan, I’ll take a mulligan on that one.
In no example, so far, is the statement “State employees on average have wages 70% higher than private employees” true.
(Hey Puddy, look I admitted Jon has a point. Feel free to act like that invalidates anything I say in the future!)
@16 You’re right. I see the error in my argument
I doubt it.
Busted ylb arschloch sucka…
Earlier you said…
Glad you finally fessed up chump.
So monomaniacal, so moronic!!!!!!
The relative pay issue is a cute but irrelevant exercise. How many minimum wage jobs are there in the public sector? There are far fewer jobs at the low end of the pay scale in the public sector making this discussion silly. ANd while there are some classifications where public sector pay is higher (generally those in lower paying jobs) here are others where the public sector pay is clearly less- IT workers and engineers are examples I can personally vouch for.
The only reason I still have a State job is the unions. Frankly, my job and those of approx. 15 others in my Dept are unnecessary.
However, if I was never hired or if I was laid off, I’d probably be flipping burgers.
Thanks to the union, I have a home, nice car and pay $750/month child support to my -ex.
I get 44 weekdays off each year for holidays, vacation, sick leave, personal and a few other things. It’s awesome. Based on 52 weeks X 5 days/week=260 potential workdays..that means I don’t work 17% of the time.I get 1 paid day off every 6 days. My benefits also are awesome. I don’t care much about my salary. The unions are great at focusing on the idea it is way too low and ignore my paid time-off and benefits. BTW, my benefits last year worked out to 31% of my Salary. What a great deal. Too good to be true.
Actually, my uncle is self-employed. If he doesn’t work, he makes nothing. What an idiot. He has 25 employees and is all stressed out. He says that I don’t really get only 44 days off, but also every weekend. So I really get 44 + 104=148 Total Days Off with pay if I was compared to a self-employed guy.
So compared to him, I get 40% of the days in the year off. AWESOME!
I think everyone should work for the government and have the same deal I get.
one more thing-
When you take my salary of $72,000 plus my benefits of $22,310 for a total off $94,310..I made more than he did and got 148 days off with pay incl weekends. He took off about one day a month. What an idiot he is. He owns a restaurant.
@4 Saving idiots from their own idiocy usually doesn’t make a person very popular, does it?
@6 “I suspect the wingnuts will likely point out that State employees on average have wages 70% higher than private employees, double the paid benefits and double the paid time-off on average.”
That’s probably true if you’re comparing the average WSDOT bridge engineer with the average fast food worker.
@6 Considering that state workers make 70% more than the private sector, why don’t we own any of the Porsches or luxury homes?
I didn’t go into public service expecting to make a lot of money, but a little appreciation would be nice.
@7 State workers do get more vacation day — in lieu of pay raises. Whenever they couldn’t afford (or didn’t want) to give the workers a COLA the legislators gave them another day off. That’s the same thing as unpaid leave days.
Of course, you still have to do the same amount of work, so you go in to the office and work on the extra leave days — without pay, of course.
@8 Are you denying that convicted Republican was sentenced for child molesting?
@10 Which proves what? We’re not discussing federal pay, we’re discussing state pay. Federal pay is much, much higher than state pay for comparable work. A federal lawyer doing work similar to what I did for the state made more than twice as much as I did.
So if federal pay is 70% higher than the private sector, my pay was 35% below the private sector. In fact, that’s what the salary surveys usually said — about 30% to 40% below comparable jobs.
The only fair way to compare pay is what different employers pay for the same work. The state has conducted professional salary surveys for decades because that’s what the personnel department uses to set pay for various job classification. Through the years the legislature consistently underfunded the salary schedule by anywhere from 20% to 40%. Plus, there’s a trick they used to underfund it even more: They used the previous survey, which mean the data were 2 years out of data, which moved the baseline down by several more percent. State workers have always been poorly paid and anyone who says differently is a liar.
@13 You’re the one who’s math challenged. Even if private pay were 70% of public pay, that wouldn’t make public pay 70% higher than private pay. It would make it 42.8% higher.
I looked at that chart in #10 and I don’t see any differentiation for education or job function. Nearly all government jobs require a college degree. Off the top of my head, I don’t know what percentage of the non-governmental civilian workforce is college educated, but it’s way less than half. They’re comparing the pay of V.A. doctors, CIA agents, and NASA engineers with truck drivers, waitresses, trash collectors, and retail clerks. That’s absurd.
@32 – @13 You’re the one who’s math challenged. Even if private pay were 70% of public pay, that wouldn’t make public pay 70% higher than private pay. It would make it 42.8% higher.
Well, let’s see. If you look @13 this is the data that is presented:
Private industry:
Benefits: $8.05 (an hour)
Wages: $19.45
Total: $27.5
State and local government:
Benefits: $13.60 (68.94% greater than private)
Wages: $26.24 (34.91% greater)
Total: $39.84 (44.87% greater)
If you read CAREFULLY dumb rabbit, you’ll see, using the precise figures, not the rounded ones used by czechsaaz, it is stated that in fact the total average compensation for public employees would be 44.87% greater than that of private employees.
I’ll leave it to you to figure out where the 70 percent claim came from.
@22 Poor poor CEOs! Poor poor business owners! We should all feel sorry for them! The working class gets all the money and they’re down to their last million dollars.
When wingnuts suffer from wealth envy of state workers, you know they’re all 7-11 clerks.
Why are you glad? Are you going to get me banned or something?
LMAO!!! I’m so scared of a silly fool…
What a moron!