"Double dipping" by California public employees is getting attention again, this time in the Los Angeles Times. Shane Goldmacher and Patrick McGreevy report.
I'm assuming she's the best example the paper could find, meaning she has the highest combined income.
I'm a fiscal conservative.
But when there is criticism about public employees double dipping - getting paid well to work while also collecting a generous pension - the ire is usually misdirected.
The problem isn't that they are working in their new position.
The problem was with the promises made long ago and the system put into place that reward and thus encourage public employees to "retire" while at the prime of their careers and still able to put in a full work week, month after month.
They were promised their retirement payments after being allowed to retired so you. They're goin to collect those payments whether they sit at home, volunteer somewhere, pick up a private sector job or state their own business, or, as these people are doing, accept a public position. This happens at the county level, too – employees will "retire" and then come back as "temporary" employees, often involved in the same work.
Like I said, they are going to get their retirement payament. In addition, someone is going to be hired to fill these positions. It isn't going to save any money to fill those positions with public employees who haven't retired (since someone will need to take that employee's old position) or someone from the private sector. The retired public employee will still get their pension, and someone is still going to get paid for working the other position.
At least when the "retired" public employee, that person usually is already familiar with the issues, programs, projects, processes, policies, and people involved.
So I don't get worked up over retired public employees taking these positions. The real concern is making sure the retirement conditions are, or have been, changed so as to stop encouraging experienced, knowledgeable employees who are still in their prime from retiring.
It would also be good to stop raising salaries for these positions to such heights.
Every month, Ann Ravel gets a paycheck from her salary as chairwoman of California's ethics watchdog agency and a second, bigger check from her public pension as a retiree.
The double payments, which total more than $305,000 a year, represent the kind of costly pension perk that Gov. Jerry Brown has vowed to rein in.
But since he assumed office nine months ago, Brown has appointed numerous officials like Ravel to state jobs in which they can simultaneously collect a full salary and a public pension.
I'm assuming she's the best example the paper could find, meaning she has the highest combined income.
Ravel, for her part, said she rightfully earned her pension after working as an attorney for Santa Clara County, whose retirement benefits come from CalPERS, from 1976 until her retirement in 2009.
"I could be sitting at my home in Los Gatos and taking my PERs check and working for a private corporation and making a ton of money," Ravel said. "But I am committed to public service."
"I feel like the taxpayers are getting their money's worth from me," she said.
I'm a fiscal conservative.
But when there is criticism about public employees double dipping - getting paid well to work while also collecting a generous pension - the ire is usually misdirected.
The problem isn't that they are working in their new position.
The problem was with the promises made long ago and the system put into place that reward and thus encourage public employees to "retire" while at the prime of their careers and still able to put in a full work week, month after month.
They were promised their retirement payments after being allowed to retired so you. They're goin to collect those payments whether they sit at home, volunteer somewhere, pick up a private sector job or state their own business, or, as these people are doing, accept a public position. This happens at the county level, too – employees will "retire" and then come back as "temporary" employees, often involved in the same work.
Like I said, they are going to get their retirement payament. In addition, someone is going to be hired to fill these positions. It isn't going to save any money to fill those positions with public employees who haven't retired (since someone will need to take that employee's old position) or someone from the private sector. The retired public employee will still get their pension, and someone is still going to get paid for working the other position.
At least when the "retired" public employee, that person usually is already familiar with the issues, programs, projects, processes, policies, and people involved.
So I don't get worked up over retired public employees taking these positions. The real concern is making sure the retirement conditions are, or have been, changed so as to stop encouraging experienced, knowledgeable employees who are still in their prime from retiring.
It would also be good to stop raising salaries for these positions to such heights.
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