The occasional, often ill-considered thoughts of a Roman Catholic permanent deacon who is ever grateful to God for his existence. Despite the strangeness we encounter in this life, all the suffering we witness and endure, being is good, so good I am sometimes unable to contain my joy. Deo gratias!


Although I am an ordained deacon of the Catholic Church, the opinions expressed in this blog are my personal opinions. In offering these personal opinions I am not acting as a representative of the Church or any Church organization.

Tuesday, September 29, 2009

The Cost of Bureaucracy

Anyone unconcerned about the ever-increasing cost of government and the bureaucracies it spawns, should take a moment and check out the statistics the Free Enterprise Nation has compiled on the growth of government and the salaries of government workers. For example...
  • When wages and benefits are combined, federal civilian workers averaged $119,982 in 2008, twice the average compensation of $59,909 for private sector workers.
  • In New York, some city workers amass more than $100,000 in overtime during their last year before retirement to create a monthly pension higher than their salary.
  • 420 of Illinois’s physical education teachers, 332 English teachers and 94 driver’s education teachers make more than $100,000 a year, with salaries for each position topping out at more than $160,000 a year.
  • In Houston, Texas the number of police officers has remained the same for six years running, despite a 40 percent budget increase to cover higher salaries, pension and health-care benefits.
  • In 2008, 40 percent of Vallejo’s 613 employees had salaries greater than $100,000 a year, the same year the California city filed for bankruptcy.
There will come a time when the cost of government will become unsustainable, when taxpayers and the private sector will simply be unable to pay for a government that continues to spend and expand at rates that far exceed the rate of expansion of the economy as a whole. One doesn't have to be an economist or a mathematician to figure that one out.

One of the long-term problems that will arise from this political and bureaucratic profligacy is that ultimately government will find itself in a position where it is unable to carry out its legitimate responsibilities such as providing for the common defense. Scary stuff.

The above represent only a sampling of the information the Free Enterprise Nation has put together. For details, see the CNBC article or even better go directly to the Free Enterprise Nation website.

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