7 ms·

> I think the million dollar question is how government organizations can hire and retain better. Simple: offer salaries that compete with the private sector.

> I think the million dollar question is how government organizations can hire and retain better. Simple: offer salaries that compete with the private sector. Of course, this involves raising tax revenues which is incredibly unpopular politically. But we get what we pay for and as long as public sector pay remains a joke compared to the private sector, we are always going to have this problem.

seoaeu 4y ago
The worst part is that it wouldn’t even require any noticeable increase in tax revenue! The salaries of the dozen or so government employees managing a billion dollar contract are a rounding error in the total cost
jcims 4y ago
I don't think it's just that simple to be honest. Government organizations are going to be held to the highest standard for equity, transparency and governance (and ideally security, but...). Building a product with artifacts that demonstrate and/or attest to all of these things creates incredible friction. I'm just coming out of a seven year stint at one of the largest banks in the world, and despite loving the people I work with I couldn't take it any more. I've on the other side of the summit in my career and I don't really want to have navigating bureaucracy be a major component of my professional efforts for the remainder of it.
- Teknoman117 4y ago
  Not to make you feel old or anything, but this sounds a lot like what happened with my dad. I'm 6 years into my career and he's mostly through his. His highest-income years were doing software development in the law department of one of the big oil companies. It basically broke him to learn what they were doing. Now he's trying to find the motivation to do contract work in his 50's because he doesn't want to deal with corporations ever again...
  - jcims 4y ago
    lol nothing you can do to make me feel older than i already do :) Give your dad a fistbump for me, it's tough, but once he finds the right customer he'll be off to the races. I've been there before and I've been thinking about doing the same myself.
ch4s3 4y ago
We could shift the model from guaranteed pensions to employee contribution retirement funds, and shift the savings to salary. We’d get better pay for civil servants, remove the incentive for bad ones to stay, and make cities and states more financially sound all in one shot.
ceeplusplus 4y ago
Not really. If you brought on vastly more competent people and digitized+automated government like the private sector, you wouldn't need to hire so many people, so you can afford to pay the competent people more. Of course, this means stepping on the toes of a bunch of incompetent lifers who are just there for the 9-5 chill life and pension, so it will never happen. You've gotta ask yourself: if private sector style pay would cost more, then wouldn't that imply the private sector is vastly more inefficient than the government? But that's clearly not the case, so we come to the conclusion that private sector pay and hiring standards must result in much greater output per dollar.
WalterBright 4y ago
In Washington State, teacher salaries were raised substantially, with no change in educational results. The thing is, just giving everyone raises doesn't work. It needs to be based on merit. I've proposed a system where teachers get a base salary, plus a substantial increment for every student in their class that meets grade level expectations at the end of the school year.
- ejb999 4y ago
  >>plus a substantial increment for every student in their class that meets grade level expectations at the end of the school year Don't be surprised when all of a sudden almost every student magically 'meets grade level expectations' and teachers get their large bonuses, and yet many of the students can't actually read when they graduate. Unfortunately, this is just an incentive to inflate grades and fudge results to make them look better.
  - WalterBright 4y ago
    Naturally, the teacher won't be in charge of evaluating their own students.
    - idontpost 4y ago
      And of course the people who are won't have any conflicts of interest of their own.
      - WalterBright 4y ago
        There are well known techniques to deal with this. It's hardly a new problem.
    - ejb999 4y ago
      But there is no real firewall between teachers and administrators - most administrators are former teachers - it's a pretty cozy club in most schools. I am not opposed to the idea in theory, but don't see any way to honestly make it work. Also fairly certain almost every teachers union will oppose it - and I say that as someone who has the experience of negotiating teacher's union contracts from the other side of the table.
arghnoname 4y ago
I've known people who work for various government agencies, some that pay well for their respective fields. It seemed to be a pattern where someone would accrue a large salary through time on the job, internal patronage, etc, but then be totally incapable or uninterested in doing their job well. They'd just hire someone else to do this person's job and shuffle titles around. No one gets fired for non-aggressive incompetence. Merit is below two or three other things when considering promotion and salary hikes. At least in the cases I'm familiar with, it's an incredibly frustrating experience. Increasing top-level salary would not fix this, but probably just increase the lack of fairness by over-paying to a greater extent the embedded poor performers.
_uy6i 4y ago
Citation please? Everything I’ve seen implies public sector employees in California make massively more than their private sector counterparts.
- loudmax 4y ago
  The article doesn't: "Instead of hiring staff, the Authority relied heavily on outside consultants. These consultants were well paid, with the primary consultant compensation for HSR at $427,000 per engineer, compared with the Authority’s in-house cost of $131,000 per engineer. This structure creates a principal-agent problem where they are incentivized to maximize their billable hours."
  - _uy6i 4y ago
    I mean that public sector employees are underpaid. Comparing consultants and in-house cost is always going to to result in 2-3x disparity (you’re paying a premium for swing capacity). I’m willing to bet the state employee is overpaid Vs his private sector non-consultant counterpart. You then have ask why hire a consultant and I think the answer is that it’s some combination of not being able to fire state employees after the project, or that those employees are actually ineffectual/incompetent. (As an aside I’m willing to bet the #’s aren’t apples to apples with the consultant being a fully loaded coast, and the in-house not including pension benefits etc)

seoaeu 4y ago

The worst part is that it wouldn’t even require any noticeable increase in tax revenue! The salaries of the dozen or so government employees managing a billion dollar contract are a rounding error in the total cost

jcims 4y ago

I don't think it's just that simple to be honest. Government organizations are going to be held to the highest standard for equity, transparency and governance (and ideally security, but...). Building a product with artifacts that demonstrate and/or attest to all of these things creates incredible friction. I'm just coming out of a seven year stint at one of the largest banks in the world, and despite loving the people I work with I couldn't take it any more. I've on the other side of the summit in my career and I don't really want to have navigating bureaucracy be a major component of my professional efforts for the remainder of it.

Teknoman117 4y ago
Not to make you feel old or anything, but this sounds a lot like what happened with my dad. I'm 6 years into my career and he's mostly through his. His highest-income years were doing software development in the law department of one of the big oil companies. It basically broke him to learn what they were doing. Now he's trying to find the motivation to do contract work in his 50's because he doesn't want to deal with corporations ever again...
- jcims 4y ago
  lol nothing you can do to make me feel older than i already do :) Give your dad a fistbump for me, it's tough, but once he finds the right customer he'll be off to the races. I've been there before and I've been thinking about doing the same myself.

ch4s3 4y ago

We could shift the model from guaranteed pensions to employee contribution retirement funds, and shift the savings to salary. We’d get better pay for civil servants, remove the incentive for bad ones to stay, and make cities and states more financially sound all in one shot.

ceeplusplus 4y ago

Not really. If you brought on vastly more competent people and digitized+automated government like the private sector, you wouldn't need to hire so many people, so you can afford to pay the competent people more. Of course, this means stepping on the toes of a bunch of incompetent lifers who are just there for the 9-5 chill life and pension, so it will never happen. You've gotta ask yourself: if private sector style pay would cost more, then wouldn't that imply the private sector is vastly more inefficient than the government? But that's clearly not the case, so we come to the conclusion that private sector pay and hiring standards must result in much greater output per dollar.

WalterBright 4y ago

In Washington State, teacher salaries were raised substantially, with no change in educational results. The thing is, just giving everyone raises doesn't work. It needs to be based on merit. I've proposed a system where teachers get a base salary, plus a substantial increment for every student in their class that meets grade level expectations at the end of the school year.

ejb999 4y ago
>>plus a substantial increment for every student in their class that meets grade level expectations at the end of the school year Don't be surprised when all of a sudden almost every student magically 'meets grade level expectations' and teachers get their large bonuses, and yet many of the students can't actually read when they graduate. Unfortunately, this is just an incentive to inflate grades and fudge results to make them look better.
- WalterBright 4y ago
  Naturally, the teacher won't be in charge of evaluating their own students.
  - idontpost 4y ago
    And of course the people who are won't have any conflicts of interest of their own.
    - WalterBright 4y ago
      There are well known techniques to deal with this. It's hardly a new problem.
  - ejb999 4y ago
    But there is no real firewall between teachers and administrators - most administrators are former teachers - it's a pretty cozy club in most schools. I am not opposed to the idea in theory, but don't see any way to honestly make it work. Also fairly certain almost every teachers union will oppose it - and I say that as someone who has the experience of negotiating teacher's union contracts from the other side of the table.

arghnoname 4y ago

I've known people who work for various government agencies, some that pay well for their respective fields. It seemed to be a pattern where someone would accrue a large salary through time on the job, internal patronage, etc, but then be totally incapable or uninterested in doing their job well. They'd just hire someone else to do this person's job and shuffle titles around. No one gets fired for non-aggressive incompetence. Merit is below two or three other things when considering promotion and salary hikes. At least in the cases I'm familiar with, it's an incredibly frustrating experience. Increasing top-level salary would not fix this, but probably just increase the lack of fairness by over-paying to a greater extent the embedded poor performers.

_uy6i 4y ago

Citation please? Everything I’ve seen implies public sector employees in California make massively more than their private sector counterparts.

loudmax 4y ago
The article doesn't: "Instead of hiring staff, the Authority relied heavily on outside consultants. These consultants were well paid, with the primary consultant compensation for HSR at $427,000 per engineer, compared with the Authority’s in-house cost of $131,000 per engineer. This structure creates a principal-agent problem where they are incentivized to maximize their billable hours."
- _uy6i 4y ago
  I mean that public sector employees are underpaid. Comparing consultants and in-house cost is always going to to result in 2-3x disparity (you’re paying a premium for swing capacity). I’m willing to bet the state employee is overpaid Vs his private sector non-consultant counterpart. You then have ask why hire a consultant and I think the answer is that it’s some combination of not being able to fire state employees after the project, or that those employees are actually ineffectual/incompetent. (As an aside I’m willing to bet the #’s aren’t apples to apples with the consultant being a fully loaded coast, and the in-house not including pension benefits etc)