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> The median salary for cops is more than $105,000 a year[1]... From what I can tell 105k a year is the highest median police salary for any state in the count

> The median salary for cops is more than $105,000 a year[1]... From what I can tell 105k a year is the highest median police salary for any state in the country. Why bring up New Jersey specifically and act like it's representative? Either use the number for the whole country or the number for Michigan, which is where the events in the article took place (and where the median salary is less than half the NJ amount).

heavyset_go 6y ago
> Why bring up New Jersey specifically and act like it's representative? Either use the number for the whole country or the number for Michigan No, I'll use New Jersey because it's the state that I'm most familiar with. New York City, which is across a river from NJ and is the largest city in the US and has the largest police department, has similar rates for their police force. You will find that police officers are some of highest paid government employees in towns, counties and states, and are the highest paid government employees in some cases. In places where the median salary for police officers are lower, median salaries for software engineers are much lower, too. My point is that police officers often make more than a lot of software engineers on this site do, and they're rewarded with benefits that are better than most engineers', along with a full pension after working for only 20 years. Yet we expect higher quality of work from junior engineers working on dating apps than we do the cops whose lazy investigative work costs people their freedom.
- rcoveson 6y ago
  > No, I'll use New Jersey because it's the state that I'm most familiar with. That's fine; you should say something like "In New Jersey, the median salary for cops is...". Stating only that "The median salary for cops is...", and then giving the number for your home state, which just happens to be the largest number in the country, in a conversation about Michigan specifically and the US broadly, is simply misleading. Yes, even though your sources make it clear it's NJ data. Your sources are supposed to back up your statements, not clarify their incompleteness. I don't disagree with the point you're trying to make. I just saw a surprising statement, checked the source, and realized that the statement was missing some critical context. And not even context that would make sense, like the Michigan number vs. the US number. This is context that no reader could possibly infer from the conversation or your wording. Making arguments that way weakens positions, it doesn't strengthen them.

heavyset_go 6y ago

> Why bring up New Jersey specifically and act like it's representative? Either use the number for the whole country or the number for Michigan No, I'll use New Jersey because it's the state that I'm most familiar with. New York City, which is across a river from NJ and is the largest city in the US and has the largest police department, has similar rates for their police force. You will find that police officers are some of highest paid government employees in towns, counties and states, and are the highest paid government employees in some cases. In places where the median salary for police officers are lower, median salaries for software engineers are much lower, too. My point is that police officers often make more than a lot of software engineers on this site do, and they're rewarded with benefits that are better than most engineers', along with a full pension after working for only 20 years. Yet we expect higher quality of work from junior engineers working on dating apps than we do the cops whose lazy investigative work costs people their freedom.

rcoveson 6y ago
> No, I'll use New Jersey because it's the state that I'm most familiar with. That's fine; you should say something like "In New Jersey, the median salary for cops is...". Stating only that "The median salary for cops is...", and then giving the number for your home state, which just happens to be the largest number in the country, in a conversation about Michigan specifically and the US broadly, is simply misleading. Yes, even though your sources make it clear it's NJ data. Your sources are supposed to back up your statements, not clarify their incompleteness. I don't disagree with the point you're trying to make. I just saw a surprising statement, checked the source, and realized that the statement was missing some critical context. And not even context that would make sense, like the Michigan number vs. the US number. This is context that no reader could possibly infer from the conversation or your wording. Making arguments that way weakens positions, it doesn't strengthen them.