Bimmerbill, it's always going to be apples and oranges. If I compare my government classification to the average person with my degree and years of experience, the full performance level of my profession in my locality of the federal government pays about 25% less. I'm in the DC locality so if I were to use RUS, the comparison is even larger but is not much better since the number I am using is the private industry data from my professional society and is an average for the entire US. (I don't know how to compare things but full performance level is really all I have.)
I can claim based on the professional society data that people in my profession working for the government reach a number of years experience where the government person makes less than even University professors. But University Professors do something different from what I myself do.
Many of the people I knew in industry have had a hard time despite their PhDs. Their companies have down-sized, merged, laid-off, etc. Some actually ended up giving up those salaries and going government.
Of course, by going management in the federal government, one can earn even more but not always stay in the same profession. I don't know where this factors into the numbers. But I do know that most managers in the federal government make more than most professionals but less than their counterparts in industry and many of these are responsible for multi- million or billion dollar programs.
What I don't understand is why in good times government people whine about their private counterparts and in bad times private workers whine about government counterparts.
The two jobs, private vs public, are often too different to price by comparision. So what is the fair price? For that matter, what is the fair price in the local market? Some local markets don't even have private jobs in my profession and some have lots; some have small business equivalents and some areas have Fortune 500 equivalent jobs.
That is why it seems to me that people just whine about, well, nonsense. The government makes the deal with me and I take the deal in good faith. Same happens in the private sector. If I am smart I measure my risk tolerance and either take that risk in the new Pharma startup that might have the next cure for cancer or I take my risk with the federal government where I might not make a lot of dough but I am not likely to end up with nothing.
If we were talking stock investment and stock risk we would be making a similar point to someone who took the higher risk going for the big money and lost the risk game. The government worker is like the guy who had a conservative portfolio; no big bonuses but less risk. So he didn't lose as much in the crash, does that mean he has to give up what he does have to make the rest of the market whole?
Government jobs and their full performance levels are well defined. Here is some stats on government raises since 1969. It's a year by year comparision of cpi, private wage increase, retiree cola and federal raises. Because the indexes don't show the picture, study the line items. The private/public advantage bobbles. With that warning about the 2009 vs 1969 data the summary is below. Table 1 in the pdf with the year by year is found at:
http://assets.opencrs.com/rpts/94-971_20100120.pdf
At year-end 2009, the overall price level as measured by the CPI was 477% higher than it was in 1969. As of January 2010, Social Security benefits have risen by 626% since 1969, and federal civil service retirement benefits have risen by 496%. Average wages among all workers in the economy have risen by 632% since 1969. Salaries for civilian federal employees have increased by 428% since 1969, and the salaries of Members of Congress have increased by 309%. This report is updated annually.
