Comments on: Update III: Who's Hiring? (Switzerland)

By: Roger Chaillet

Roger Chaillet — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 02:17:32 +0000

Too bad no one mentioned C. Northcote Parkinson author of Parkinson’s Law. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parkinson%27s_Law

And here’s yet another reason why Uncle Sam’s payroll is bloating up like Ted Kennedy on ‘roids. http://lashawnbarber.com/archives/2004/07/30/blacks-overrepresented-in-federal-government/

It’s a virtuous circle: More government workers equal more Obama voters equal more government workers. And so on ad infinitum.

I should call it Chaillet’s Corollary.

By: Roy Bleckert

Roy Bleckert — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 05:40:36 +0000

Milton Friedman has a compelling theory on government jobs

The Most Persistent Economic Fallacy of All Time!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hrg1CArkuNc&eurl=http%3A%2F%2Fmjperry.blogspot.com%2F&feature=player_embedded

By: M. B. Moon

M. B. Moon — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 05:07:13 +0000

Myron,
I know you work for the government and I don’t consider you a leech. Consider: If the Government employed 100% of US what shame would there be in being a government worker? How much of the private sector has been crowded out by government? One has to eat. I appreciate that you feel you may bite the hand that feeds you since it stole from you in the first place!

[Also, b/c of various state monopolies and corruptions, individuals with certain qualifications and skills often cannot get work in the private sector.]

By: Myron Pauli

Myron Pauli — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 03:42:48 +0000

Dear M. B. Moon –

Government employees have ample incentive to grow like a cancer. Work alone and you might be a GS-12. Supervise a few and you are a GS-13. Supervise 25 and you might be a GS-14. – you get the drift.

Cut the budget!!! — What fun is there in that – that will only get you an unsatisfactory. I’ve ticked off many people when I told them that their harebrained schemes won’t work – they never want to hear it – rather they want even more money to throw down their ratholes. As one Air Force Col. said to me when I said in 1988 how ludicrous it was to do “detailed engineering drawings” of Soviet systems for year 2050 (I even said “how do you even know there will be a Soviet Union in 2050”) “SHUT UP!”

By: Barbara Grant

Barbara Grant — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 21:32:17 +0000

Myron, I agree with your reasoning about the tax base for government jobs, even those jobs held by employees of the contracting firms you mention. I’d like to add, though, that an employee of a government contractor does not in any way have a “secure” position similar to that of a government employee. In fact, their positions are based on continued contracts according to the will of government officials, and they can be easily laid off in droves, basically overnight (which happened at the end of the Cold War in the early 1990s.)

If the Obama Administration is creating hundreds of thousands of new government positions, they are essentially providing an opportunity for the same number of martinets to be in authority over non-government employees who may eventually have to turn cartwheels to continue to receive work. There is no good reason to do this.

By: M. B. Moon

M. B. Moon — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 20:20:35 +0000

OK, I lied.

Roger,
Brilliant comment. Next time I’ll read all the comments before I post (well, at least yours).

By: M. B. Moon

M. B. Moon — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 18:55:41 +0000

I’ll desist after this:

Government: That place where busybodies can do their thing and get paid for it.

(busybody: A person who meddles or pries into the affairs of others. from http://www.thefreedictionary.com/busybody)

By: M. B. Moon

M. B. Moon — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 18:13:33 +0000

“The growth of government, of course, means that many more leaches will be implementing onerous rules and regulations that make it even harder for the struggling private economy to recover.” Ilana

Dear Government Leeches,

Be wise. A successful parasite does not kill its host! Be content to merely loot and leave the wealth generators alone.

By: Roger Chaillet

Roger Chaillet — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 15:42:31 +0000

It’s not really a zero-sum game.

It’s less than zero.

I learned this long ago as a native of Washington, D.C.

The Department of Education, for example, educates no one, yet does much, much harm to this country.

A zero-sum game would be to pay government workers to stay home and not meddle. There would be a financial cost, but no loss of individual liberties.

By: Myron Pauli

Myron Pauli — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 08:11:48 +0000

Actually, if the money that is employing person X comes from taxing (robbing) person Y, it is defacto a “government job” even if X is nominally employed by SAIC, Blackwater, Lockheed Martin, or General Motors. If anything, the statistics UNDERestimate the degree of parastism in the economy.