Last evening in the car I’m listening to the Mark Levin Show and guest host Inga Bark. She spent most of 3-hours discussing Bell, California and although this story broke a few weeks ago I never heard about it. Fasten your seat belt; this is the tip of my iceberg.

Former Bell City Manager, Robert Rizzo, was living the high life off the taxpayer’s dole. His salary was $787,000 per year with perks increasing Rizzo’s compensation to more than $1.5 million. Rizzo’s benefits package — which covers time off as well as retirement, medical and other types of insurance — shows he was paid for time off that amounted to more than 20 weeks per year. Rizzo was to receive $386,786 in paid vacation and sick benefits this year on top of his base salary. Documents appear to show Rizzo was being paid for 107 vacation days and 36 sick days a year and the city paid $48,996 annually into Rizzo’s deferred compensation plans.

Bell also paid $20,496 into Rizzo’s 457 plan, which is similar to a 401(k) for government employees. According to Rizzo’s contract, the city was to pay the full amount of his 457 plan in the first 10 days of the year, meaning he could benefit from an entire year of interest or investment gains.

We’re still looking at the tip of that Bell iceberg.

The city of about 40,000 residents came to national attention after the Los Angeles Times reported last month that Rizzo was being paid his hefty salary, Police Chief Randy Adams was being paid $457,000 annually, and Assistant City Manager Angela Spaccia received $376,000. Additionally, the mayor and three of the other four council members were being paid around $100,000 for their part-time jobs. (Here’s a little document listing all Bell government jobs.)

This is one fine example of government fraud. Resignations should not be enough; jail time would be in order.

Digging much deeper than the city of Bell we keep hearing about stimulus and the need to pay teachers, first responders such as police and firemen. We need all those jobs but is it necessary that government employees and teachers receive benefits above what the average taxpayer is receiving.  Why do government jobs warrant higher pay?

The Wall Street Journal reports that personal incomes fell across the US last year except in areas with a high concentration of federal government jobs.

Washington DC was one of just three metro areas that saw both net earnings and personal income rise. And those gains were due entirely to the growth of the federal government; private sector compensation in the Washington metropolitan area actually fell. Nationally, private wages fell six percent in 2009 while government pay rose 2.6 percent.

USA Today reports that federal employees’ average compensation has grown to more than double what private sector workers earn.

Federal civil servants earned average pay and benefits of $123,049 in 2009 while private workers made $61,051 in total compensation, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis. The federal compensation advantage has grown from $30,415 in 2000 to $61,998 last year.

Chris Edwards, a budget analyst at the libertarian Cato Institute, thinks this is a genuine problem.

“Can’t we now all agree that federal workers are overpaid and do something about it?” he asks.

These numbers don’t lie:

1. Benefits – Federal workers received average benefits worth $41,791 in 2009. Most of this was the government’s contribution to pensions. Employees contributed an additional $10,569.
2. Pay – The average federal salary has grown 33% faster than inflation since 2000. USA TODAY reported in March that the federal government pays an average of 20% more than private firms for comparable occupations. The analysis did not consider differences in experience and education.
3. Total compensation – Federal compensation has grown 36.9% since 2000 after adjusting for inflation, compared with 8.8% for private workers.

The Heritage Foundation’s James Sherk found that federal employees get paid 22 percent more per hour on average than private-sector workers. Throw in the lavish benefits that federal government workers receive, and federal employees earn approximately 30 to 40 percent more in total compensation than comparable private-sector workers.

* The federal pay system gives the average federal employee hourly cash earnings 22 percent above the average private worker’s, controlling for observable skills and characteristics.
* Including non-cash benefits adds to this disparity. The average private-sector employer pays $9,882 per employee in annual benefits, while the federal government pays an average of $32,115 per employee.
* Overall, controlling for other factors, federal employees earn approximately 30 percent to 40 percent more in total compensation (wages and benefits) than comparable private-sector workers.
* Federal employees enjoy job security irrespective of the state of the economy. Since the recession began, federal employment has risen by 240,000—12 percent. The unemployment rate for federal employees has only slightly risen from 2.0 percent to 2.9 percent between 2007 and 2009.
* Federal employees demonstrate with their actions that they receive better compensation in the public sector than in the private sector: They quit their jobs at one-third the rate of the private employees.
* Bringing federal compensation in line with private-sector compensation would save taxpayers approximately $47 billion in 2011.

Barack Obama requested a 1.4% across-the-board pay hike for the 2 million federal workers who are also eligible for additional seniority pay hikes. Jobs are being lost, and job growth is being killed by Obama policy, the government destroys private sector jobs but grows the government and those well-paid jobs all on the government dole and the backs of the taxpayer. Indeed!

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