6 ms·

Federal spending is stable over time

70 points by alpinisme 2y ago

Terr_ 2y ago
I'd also point out that one of the big assets of the US government as an employer is an implicit promise of stability, which helps it compete for employees against the private sector despite offering lower wages. The recent half-random half-stupid-keyword firing spree is smashing that asset to pieces, which means the government will have to start offering more in wages to keep attracting competent candidates, which is likely to overwhelm any short-term "savings." Or at any rate, it will on a longer time-horizon, which might not matter to perpetrators who plan to make a giant mess and leave it behind for someone else to handle.
- nine_zeros 2y ago
  > I'd also point out that one of the big assets of the US government as an employer is an implicit promise of stability, which helps it compete for employees against the private sector despite offering lower wages. And billionaires hate that people have alternatives to slaving away for them.
- babyshake 2y ago
  This is absolutely true. I know people who have worked for the government for 10+ years, and they specifically highlight the stability as the one reason they haven't moved to the private sector where you may need to be looking for a new job every few years. Of course Musk etc. see this as a bug, not a feature, and think that every worker needs to constantly justify their employment.
  - Henchman21 2y ago
    [flagged]
    - blooalien 2y ago
      Would be a total waste of time. Any answer they might give would just be the usual boat-load of blatant and obvious lies which would of course be instantly believed as "gospel truth" by their army of death-cult worshipers.
    - Terr_ 2y ago
      Careful, don't make mistake of thinking that "they didn't get there by virtue" is the same as "they got there by evil." Simple economic models show that it's possible to end up with levels of inequality that match reality, even when all the players are equally lucky and have no difference in character. To twist the idiom: Hate some of the players if you want, but remember to mostly keep hating the game.
      - moshun 2y ago
        It’s fascinating to see arguments like this pop up from time to time when the wealthiest consistently move to consolidate power, control/manipulate information to enrich themselves, and now in the U.S., openly steer the government to feed bottomless greed. It’s simply not possible to reach anything close to a single billion without unbelievable exploitation of lower classes and it scales as you get richer. Saying “they got there by evil” seems completely reasonable by any moral standard not written by sociopaths.
        ivewonyoung 2y ago
        > It’s simply not possible to reach anything close to a single billion without unbelievable exploitation of lower classes and it scales as you get richer. Whatsapp's founders made $6.8B each from the acquisition, Whatsapp only had 55 employees when acquired who all got a big payout afaik. What lower class 'got unbelievably exploited'?
- missedthecue 2y ago
  The average federal US employee earns $106k a year on top of quite a few generous benefits. I don't think, based on available data, that they are underpaid relative to the private sector, though I see it said so often online it appears to be "common knowledge". Maybe it was true 50 years ago? Maybe it's just the people repeating it... Are they paid less compared to high tech? Yes.
  - Terr_ 2y ago
    Looking for the $106k number, I find this [0], which: > [...] doesn’t include postal workers, congressional staffers, employees of the government’s various intelligence agencies or presidential appointees who require Senate confirmation. As for comparisons to the private-sector, there's a useful graph from 2022 [1] that compares wages+benefits broken down by employee education levels. [0] https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2025/01/07/what-the-data-says-about-federal-workers/ https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2025/01/07/what-the-... [1] https://www.cbo.gov/publication/60235 https://www.cbo.gov/publication/60235
    - missedthecue 2y ago
      Compared to the federal workforce, the number of congressional staffers is a rounding error. Those working at intelligence agencies and presidential appointees are all likely near or well above $106k. You're talking about secretaries and undersecretaries and directors of entire government departments. FYI, the survey also didn't include uniformed service personnel.
  - dialup_sounds 2y ago
    Is there a source for that $106k? What I'm seeing puts the average fed at GS-10, which is less than that.
    - missedthecue 2y ago
      OPM internal report last year. https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2025/01/07/what-the-data-says-about-federal-workers/ https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2025/01/07/what-the-...
- xnx 2y ago
  To them this is an added benefit in the process of destroying the US government.
drivebyhooting 2y ago
If spending is not out of control then how do we square that with nearing 2 trillion in debt added each year? Is there a trick that makes that state of affairs sustainable?
- rhelz 2y ago
  It's not really any mystery. We had a surplus in the Late 90's. Taxes were cut by George W Bush and again by Trump. There is no such thing as a self-funding tax cut. Doesn't matter how steady the spending is, if the income is cut, you will start going in debt.
  - NewJazz 2y ago
    Didn't we also have a financial crisis in the late 90s? Asian financial crisis, Dotcom bubble? Was the surplus during those years?
    - oblio 2y ago
      Fairly sure Clinton left with a surplus. The Asian financial crisis primarily affected... Asia, and the dotcom bubble wasn't a humongous issue outside of IT, which was a much smaller sector back then.
      - Jtsummers 2y ago
        https://fiscaldata.treasury.gov/americas-finance-guide/national-deficit/ https://fiscaldata.treasury.gov/americas-finance-guide/natio... Yes, he did. Deficit spending returned with George W Bush, reaching a high with the Global Financial Crisis, was getting back under control until Trump, and then peaked with COVID.
        ceejayoz 2y ago
        edit: Whoops.
water9 2y ago
Don’t believe your eyes and ears, spending is stable that’s how you end up with 37 trillion in debt. Common sense he’s not common anymore.
- stouset 2y ago
  It’s almost as if there are two(!) components to deficits. If it isn’t spending, what could the other factor possibly be?
  - water9 2y ago
    It could be that spending other peoples money is really easy and really wasteful.
- kentm 2y ago
  By cutting taxes. Republicans have been slashing taxes for decades without cutting spending.
  - water9 2y ago
    Government is spending money on Bert and Ernie in Baghdad. It’s not the taxes that’s the problem.
drivebyhooting 2y ago
You could tax the top 20 US companies global REVENUE at 20% and still only cover half of the deficit.
- drivebyhooting 2y ago
  Did ChatGPT do the math wrong or is this fact inconvenient?
  - ceejayoz 2y ago
    One should generally assume ChatGPT did the math wrong.
- daveguy 2y ago
  Wow, that seems like a good chunk of the problem. You could probably get through another good chunk with taxes on the billionaires and multimillionaires. Just spit balling here.
- ceejayoz 2y ago
  So with a small tax on just the biggest handful of companies we could fix half the problem in one go? Where do we sign up?
  - drivebyhooting 2y ago
    20% tax on revenue? That’s insane. Wr’d all be fired if this were implemented.
    - ceejayoz 2y ago
      The EU and Australia seem to survive a 20% VAT. What if we did the biggest 100 or 1000 companies at a smaller rate, instead?
  - missedthecue 2y ago
    a 20% tax on revenue would put them out of business, because it's greater than their net margins. Revenue, not profit.
new_user_final 2y ago
[flagged]
- anon_cow1111 2y ago
  Tribalism is a hell of a drug. Logic need not apply beyond that point. Regardless of whether you're left or right leaning
cs702 2y ago
Before you comment here, may I suggest you first read and make sure you understand the national income and product account (NIPA) tables mentioned by the OP? These tables are accounting statements compiled by... accountants. The tables show accounting balances at end of periods, such as and accounting flows over those periods. https://apps.bea.gov/iTable/?reqid=19&step=2&isuri=1&categories=survey https://apps.bea.gov/iTable/?reqid=19&step=2&isuri=1&categor... If you have never even seen these tables, of if you have seen them but don't understand them, please refrain from making uninformed ideological comments. Such comments convince no one and help no one. Instead, ask questions. There are quite a few people on HN who can answer them.
josh-sematic 2y ago
US debt as a percentage of GDP: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/gfdegdq188S https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/gfdegdq188S
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
CaffeineLD50 2y ago
Yes, its hyperbole to justify drastic cuts. The real enemy is ideological. This is a classic purge disguised as fiscal restraint. Round 2 will be "gosh, I guess it was too much, let's hire our cronies to fill the empty jobs". A similar cover story is used to justify executive bonuses and job cuts (" AI efficiency! ") or gut internal guardrails against some opinioms (" free speech!"). It doesn't matter than spending isn't out of control, or AI can't really make people all that much more efficient or that the purported free speech turns into free speech just for the owner's speech. Propaganda has its own grim rules.

70 points by alpinisme 2y ago

I'd also point out that one of the big assets of the US government as an employer is an implicit promise of stability, which helps it compete for employees against the private sector despite offering lower wages. The recent half-random half-stupid-keyword firing spree is smashing that asset to pieces, which means the government will have to start offering more in wages to keep attracting competent candidates, which is likely to overwhelm any short-term "savings." Or at any rate, it will on a longer time-horizon, which might not matter to perpetrators who plan to make a giant mess and leave it behind for someone else to handle.

nine_zeros 2y ago
> I'd also point out that one of the big assets of the US government as an employer is an implicit promise of stability, which helps it compete for employees against the private sector despite offering lower wages. And billionaires hate that people have alternatives to slaving away for them.
babyshake 2y ago
This is absolutely true. I know people who have worked for the government for 10+ years, and they specifically highlight the stability as the one reason they haven't moved to the private sector where you may need to be looking for a new job every few years. Of course Musk etc. see this as a bug, not a feature, and think that every worker needs to constantly justify their employment.
- Henchman21 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - blooalien 2y ago
    Would be a total waste of time. Any answer they might give would just be the usual boat-load of blatant and obvious lies which would of course be instantly believed as "gospel truth" by their army of death-cult worshipers.
  - Terr_ 2y ago
    Careful, don't make mistake of thinking that "they didn't get there by virtue" is the same as "they got there by evil." Simple economic models show that it's possible to end up with levels of inequality that match reality, even when all the players are equally lucky and have no difference in character. To twist the idiom: Hate some of the players if you want, but remember to mostly keep hating the game.
    - moshun 2y ago
      It’s fascinating to see arguments like this pop up from time to time when the wealthiest consistently move to consolidate power, control/manipulate information to enrich themselves, and now in the U.S., openly steer the government to feed bottomless greed. It’s simply not possible to reach anything close to a single billion without unbelievable exploitation of lower classes and it scales as you get richer. Saying “they got there by evil” seems completely reasonable by any moral standard not written by sociopaths.
      - ivewonyoung 2y ago
        > It’s simply not possible to reach anything close to a single billion without unbelievable exploitation of lower classes and it scales as you get richer. Whatsapp's founders made $6.8B each from the acquisition, Whatsapp only had 55 employees when acquired who all got a big payout afaik. What lower class 'got unbelievably exploited'?
missedthecue 2y ago
The average federal US employee earns $106k a year on top of quite a few generous benefits. I don't think, based on available data, that they are underpaid relative to the private sector, though I see it said so often online it appears to be "common knowledge". Maybe it was true 50 years ago? Maybe it's just the people repeating it... Are they paid less compared to high tech? Yes.
- Terr_ 2y ago
  Looking for the $106k number, I find this [0], which: > [...] doesn’t include postal workers, congressional staffers, employees of the government’s various intelligence agencies or presidential appointees who require Senate confirmation. As for comparisons to the private-sector, there's a useful graph from 2022 [1] that compares wages+benefits broken down by employee education levels. [0] https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2025/01/07/what-the-data-says-about-federal-workers/ https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2025/01/07/what-the-... [1] https://www.cbo.gov/publication/60235 https://www.cbo.gov/publication/60235
  - missedthecue 2y ago
    Compared to the federal workforce, the number of congressional staffers is a rounding error. Those working at intelligence agencies and presidential appointees are all likely near or well above $106k. You're talking about secretaries and undersecretaries and directors of entire government departments. FYI, the survey also didn't include uniformed service personnel.
- dialup_sounds 2y ago
  Is there a source for that $106k? What I'm seeing puts the average fed at GS-10, which is less than that.
  - missedthecue 2y ago
    OPM internal report last year. https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2025/01/07/what-the-data-says-about-federal-workers/ https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2025/01/07/what-the-...
xnx 2y ago
To them this is an added benefit in the process of destroying the US government.

drivebyhooting 2y ago

If spending is not out of control then how do we square that with nearing 2 trillion in debt added each year? Is there a trick that makes that state of affairs sustainable?

rhelz 2y ago
It's not really any mystery. We had a surplus in the Late 90's. Taxes were cut by George W Bush and again by Trump. There is no such thing as a self-funding tax cut. Doesn't matter how steady the spending is, if the income is cut, you will start going in debt.
- NewJazz 2y ago
  Didn't we also have a financial crisis in the late 90s? Asian financial crisis, Dotcom bubble? Was the surplus during those years?
  - oblio 2y ago
    Fairly sure Clinton left with a surplus. The Asian financial crisis primarily affected... Asia, and the dotcom bubble wasn't a humongous issue outside of IT, which was a much smaller sector back then.
    - Jtsummers 2y ago
      https://fiscaldata.treasury.gov/americas-finance-guide/national-deficit/ https://fiscaldata.treasury.gov/americas-finance-guide/natio... Yes, he did. Deficit spending returned with George W Bush, reaching a high with the Global Financial Crisis, was getting back under control until Trump, and then peaked with COVID.
      - ceejayoz 2y ago
        edit: Whoops.

water9 2y ago

Don’t believe your eyes and ears, spending is stable that’s how you end up with 37 trillion in debt. Common sense he’s not common anymore.

stouset 2y ago
It’s almost as if there are two(!) components to deficits. If it isn’t spending, what could the other factor possibly be?
- water9 2y ago
  It could be that spending other peoples money is really easy and really wasteful.
kentm 2y ago
By cutting taxes. Republicans have been slashing taxes for decades without cutting spending.
- water9 2y ago
  Government is spending money on Bert and Ernie in Baghdad. It’s not the taxes that’s the problem.

drivebyhooting 2y ago

You could tax the top 20 US companies global REVENUE at 20% and still only cover half of the deficit.

drivebyhooting 2y ago
Did ChatGPT do the math wrong or is this fact inconvenient?
- ceejayoz 2y ago
  One should generally assume ChatGPT did the math wrong.
daveguy 2y ago
Wow, that seems like a good chunk of the problem. You could probably get through another good chunk with taxes on the billionaires and multimillionaires. Just spit balling here.
ceejayoz 2y ago
So with a small tax on just the biggest handful of companies we could fix half the problem in one go? Where do we sign up?
- drivebyhooting 2y ago
  20% tax on revenue? That’s insane. Wr’d all be fired if this were implemented.
  - ceejayoz 2y ago
    The EU and Australia seem to survive a 20% VAT. What if we did the biggest 100 or 1000 companies at a smaller rate, instead?
- missedthecue 2y ago
  a 20% tax on revenue would put them out of business, because it's greater than their net margins. Revenue, not profit.

new_user_final 2y ago

[flagged]

anon_cow1111 2y ago
Tribalism is a hell of a drug. Logic need not apply beyond that point. Regardless of whether you're left or right leaning

cs702 2y ago

Before you comment here, may I suggest you first read and make sure you understand the national income and product account (NIPA) tables mentioned by the OP? These tables are accounting statements compiled by... accountants. The tables show accounting balances at end of periods, such as and accounting flows over those periods. https://apps.bea.gov/iTable/?reqid=19&step=2&isuri=1&categories=survey https://apps.bea.gov/iTable/?reqid=19&step=2&isuri=1&categor... If you have never even seen these tables, of if you have seen them but don't understand them, please refrain from making uninformed ideological comments. Such comments convince no one and help no one. Instead, ask questions. There are quite a few people on HN who can answer them.

josh-sematic 2y ago

US debt as a percentage of GDP: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/gfdegdq188S https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/gfdegdq188S

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

CaffeineLD50 2y ago

Yes, its hyperbole to justify drastic cuts. The real enemy is ideological. This is a classic purge disguised as fiscal restraint. Round 2 will be "gosh, I guess it was too much, let's hire our cronies to fill the empty jobs". A similar cover story is used to justify executive bonuses and job cuts (" AI efficiency! ") or gut internal guardrails against some opinioms (" free speech!"). It doesn't matter than spending isn't out of control, or AI can't really make people all that much more efficient or that the purported free speech turns into free speech just for the owner's speech. Propaganda has its own grim rules.