Milwaukee Urinal/Sentinel takes closer look at public and private compensation

[Scuba]

http://www.jsonline.com/news/opinion/119023584.html


<snip>

The pretext for such cuts is that public employees are overpaid. Govs. Scott Walker of Wisconsin, Chris Christie of New Jersey and Rick Scott of Florida, among others, assert that public-sector employees are paid 30% more than private-sector employees, and they conclude that cuts therefore can be made without much exodus of employees. They arrive at this figure by comparing average salaries in the private and public sectors.

But there is a flaw in using this simple comparison of all private-sector workers to all public-sector workers: It ignores the different mixtures of task and talent requirements, essentially a comparison of fruit when there are different mixtures of apples and oranges. For example, since so many public employees are teachers and other professionals, the percentage of people with advanced degrees is higher in the public sector.

To make the more accurate comparison that accounts for differences in tasks, education levels, experience and labor market competitiveness in the two sectors, advanced statistical work is required. Numerous statistical studies - including the frequently cited study by economists Keith Bender and John Heywood of the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee - have shown that there is no premium for working in the public sector, even when taking benefits into account.


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[Scuba]

1. And an excellent blog comment...

All f this statistical analysis ad naseum masks what people's own five senses and common sense should be telling them: Are the snow plow drivers driving Lexuses to work when it storms? Are school parking lots filled with the Cadillacs and Lincoln Navigators that teachers drive to school? Are the clerks at county offices and DOT license renewal sites sending their children to the most expensive private colleges. Are the big boats lined up at marinas on the Great Lakes owned by the pothole fillers at the highway department?

Sure, one can find statistics that show that in this way being a public employee is better and in this way it's worse, but instinct and common sense tells us that public employees are common middle class working folks.
So do they desreve to have a beat-down put on them where they have their take-home pay cut by 8%, and have it written into law that their compensation can only go down relative to inflation, and not up? Does a specific segment of the middle class deserve to have their standard of living lowered permanently?

[sinkingfeeling]

2. + 1,000,000

[sinkingfeeling]

3. I wish people would push this point: if you want everybody to be paid equally, isn't that a huge

re-distribution of wealth? Isn't that a socialist scam? Isn't that what the GOP and TeaBaggers say they so oppose?

[elocs]

4. I think that here in WI 3 times as many public sector workers have higher education degrees

than the general public. That difference should clearly be reflected in their financial compensation.

[mysuzuki2]

5. There's an old saying-

statistics don't lie but statisticians do.