Public Service Acadamies?
Posted by
Kevin
This is an interesting idea:
Presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton told college Democrats on Saturday she would create a national academy to train public servants.
“I’m going to be asking a new generation to serve,” she said. “I think just like our military academies, we need to give a totally all-paid education to young men and women who will serve their country in a public service position.”
On the plus side, it would elevate the status of the civil service. If it has its won academies then, like the military, graduating from that academy would bring with a certain level of respect. It would help create a sense of professional pride and a help create a standard template for behavior and ethics followed across all branches of the civil service. it could also foster a sense of duty to the country in the same way the armed services academies do in the military. It would provide a clear, easily followed path to public service, something that only the military has right now.
On the other hand, the civil services are more varied in requirements than the military academies are. How could on university encompass all the different kinds of expertise the government requires? I suppose they could teach general principles and then send the graduates to get Masters and PhDs as they advance in the service. The military does something like this now. The military also has the ROTC training programs which help overcome another problem with this notion: a single university or set of university will inevitably become insular and reward certain ways of thinking about the world over others. Too much of that leads to stagnation.
The devil, as always, is in the details, but this is the kind of small seeming idea that could have long lasting and positive implications for the good of the country.
Which, of course, means that it will get on one-hundredth the coverage of her breasts.
Yes — how can one university manage to teach both constant rudeness to customers, slow movement times, long on-the-clock breaks, the worst possible times to answer cell phones in front of customers?
The poor management techniques we see today at VAs around the country alone would take up an entire campus at a normal location; you just can’t teach that level of elegance in a single classroom. More than two semesters in a row, at least, since the building would fall down not long after.
From each according to their ability, to each according to their needs?
Comment 8/2/2007
Given that the average federal employee already earns more than twice that of the average private sector employee as well as having much job security, I’m not exactly sure what the argument for subsidizing their education is.
This seems to me just pandering to a politically powerful group (government employee unions) to buy votes.
Comment 8/2/2007
stormy
Really - -government employees earn twice as much as their peers in private sector? Really?
Gat
wrong in at least one respect –VA rates great in customer satisfaction.
Comment 8/2/2007
I’ve seen things close to that data point before, although I’m unsure the veracity of it or Stormy’s numbers. I wouldn’t be surprised for some portions, at least, since I know the low education end of the market you can get 10-14 dollars an hour for running paper in a place where a normal business would only find it worth 7 bucks an hour. On the other hand, nearly everyone I know that’s left the military did so because every job outside the force with similar levels of education pays much, much better. Likewise, government psychologist with a Master’s but no experience is only a GS-9, the sorta pay you expect for flipping burgers part-time.
wrong in at least one respect –VA rates great in customer satisfaction.
My complaints about the VA systems were limited to infrastructure rather than customer service (I’ve honestly never been a customer to say, although I’m still highly suspicious of those survey numbers).
Most but not all VA clinics around the country have fallen into various states of disrepair. The one in Florida was of particular notice simply because it made NewsWeek, but Dayton and Boston VAs have likewise been falling apart. This isn’t because of low funding; management areas are incredibly well furnished, and the coffers are far from empty. It’s just poor management to the point of neglegence, to the point where unused VA-owned buildings are literally going unmaintained for years because there was no need for them at for a couple summers.
Comment 8/2/2007
Gat
First, note that it snot that the paper puching isn’t worth 10-14 dollars an hour, its that compnaies have the bargaining power and can get away with only paying 7 dollars an hour because of our anti-union laws.
Also, it’s not clerical people we are talking about with these academies but rather specialists and field experts.
Second, the VA gets better health results than private care. And the VA budget has been cut or not raised per the need considering the Iraq war veterans by the Bush Administration. So, yeah, funds are an obvious issue.
Comment 8/2/2007
Given that people are quite happy to push paper for seven bucks an hour, and companies are quite unwilling to , I’d say paper pushing isn’t
Customer satisfaction surveys do not equal results. Those numbers also seem a might bit suspicious, given that they’re administered in different manners from the governmental to the public sector.
Which would explain the remarkably poor status many of these buildings have been in for over a decade… how?
Comment 8/2/2007
“Which would explain the remarkably poor status many of these buildings have been in for over a decade… how?”
You need to provide some evidence that this is a widespread problem. Because otherwise, well, google Burdeath.
“Customer satisfaction surveys do not equal results.”
Sorry, wrong link: here is what I meant to link to.
“Given that people are quite happy to push paper for seven bucks an hour, and companies are quite unwilling to , I’d say paper pushing isn’t”
This is choppy, but I think you are saying that people are taking exactly what they want for doing a job, as if there was not a significant difference in bargaining power between an individual and a company. And that is just obviously wrong.
Comment 8/2/2007
You need to provide some evidence that this is a widespread problem. Because otherwise, well, google Burdeath.
I’ve personally seen the insides of the Dayton, Boston, and the Florida VA. But, hey, if you don’t believe me, it’s not exactly hard to find other people who notice it.
As for Burdeath, all I get is something on myspace or a few file names.
I don’t agree with Murray’s opinions on solutions, not when they’re wasting money on the ‘director’s’ pay or digital computer records, but I expect it’s a bit more moving a statement.
Ah, because linking to the VA’s own review of its performance was just too powerful a source, we must instead go to a site specifically devoted to presenting a liberal socialist viewpoint. I mean, they claim Great Britain’s health care has no notably worse outcomes. Should I return your Ezra Klein with an Ann Coulter or similar bullshit artist?
And, again, it’s pointing to predominately survey information that I just can’t believe are uniformly applied from one sector of the market to the next. Many other criteria, such as the wait time numbers, are baked to the point of scorching.
No, I’m not saying people are getting what they want. I’d wager all of us would like a few hundred bucks an hour to sit on our backsides. But, on the other hand, it’s pretty clear people are willing to work these jobs at these rates.
Comment 8/2/2007
From Department of Commerce Bureau of Economic Analysis:
2006 Total Employee Compensation:
Private industries: $6,043,977m
Federal government: $ 424,234m
State and local: $ 986,580m
2006 Full Time Equivalent Employees
Private industries: 108,959k
Federal government: 4,069k
State and local: 15,983k
From the above:
2006 Average annual compensation
Private industries: $ 55,470
Federal government: $104,260
State and local: $ 61,726
Comment 8/2/2007
The average Federal emloyee is compensated at a super grade level? I am not buying that. Will investigate….
Comment 8/2/2007
Folks,
Before you get too lost in the tangent on federal salaries, I hope you will take the time to check out the website on the Public Service Academy idea:
http://www.uspublicserviceacademy.org
Dismissive comments about public servants nothwithstanding, there is a serious need for us to develop better civilian leadership and more effective public institutions.
This is a movement, folks. I hope you will join us.
Chris
Comment 8/2/2007
Stormy and Ted,
Realize that that kind of gross mean indicates just about nothing. You need at least a median and a standard deviation to get even an inkling of the distribution.
Comment 8/2/2007
Oh, and some co-variance between salaries and their local cost-of-living would be great, but now I’m just wishing for a pony.
Comment 8/2/2007
Dan M:
THANK YOU! I’ve been on the “averages are meaningless [at least without context]” soapbox for some time, but I never seem to get anywhere.
Comment 8/2/2007
Medians may be more useful, but that doesn’t mean means are meaningless (they’re just less robust). Also, given that there’s no government equivalent of a millionaire CEO, medians would likely make the disparity even larger.
Comment 8/2/2007
Clinton blasts Cheney over Iraq letter…
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton on Wednesday accused Vice President Dick Cheney of falsely portraying he…
Trackback 8/3/2007
Stormy,
Means aren’t robust in a fairly particular mathematical sense. For most distribution functions, especially the Gaussian, the probability of a sample’s mean matching that of the distribution is smaller than the same quality match for the median.
But that’s not at all what I’m talking about. A mean of a sample not only doesn’t tell you much about the location of a known distribution function with unknown parameters, it tells you absolutely nothing about the shape of an unknown distribution function.
Nevermind the covariance, a raw mean doesn’t disambiguate a Gaussian, a Poisson, or a Maxwell distribution. A standard deviation can help a little with that, but really you need at least the second moment of the data.
Given that the stats in question are being used to compare two distributions, it’s absolutely critical to know not just how their means compare, but how their overall shapes compare. I have to one-up TG here and say that not only do stats need to have standard deviations reported, but they need covariance reported in order to mean anything at all.
Comment 8/3/2007
Stormy:
In addition to what Dan M says, you’re also forgetting that much of the income that millionaire CEOs receive is of a type not listed as “compensation,” and therefore not included in those figures.
But, as Ted said, it would shock me to learn that the average federal employee gets a six-figure salary. None of the rank-and-file government jobs I can think of make anywhere near that much.
Comment 8/3/2007
According to this, the average salary of a full-time federal employee in 2004 was just over $60,000. If that’s accurate, and Stormy’s numbers are also accurate, that would be a 67% increase in just two years.
But I think I see where the discrepancy is. Stormy’s figures include the cost of benefits, which for all full-time federal employees include health care and a pension plan. Whereas there are a lot of private sector jobs that have shit for benefits, if they have any at all.
Comment 8/3/2007
I was mislead by “total”. It’s total compensation per employee (in other words includes benefits) not total salaries for all employees.
There has been significant salary creep in the last 8 years for federal employees - way above inflation - which I was not aware of.
That said, the comparison is meaningless, unless one assumes the composition of the two workforces are the same. I think we can agree that is not the case. Especially since the federal employee numbers are skewed by not including the bulk of the low paid federal employees (military).
Comment 8/3/2007
Actually, the figures I mentioned DID include the military Ted.
Comment 8/3/2007
Stormy:
Part of the problem is, the link you provided to your figures just show a giant list of reports, and you’d have to hunt a long time to find the specific report you’re working from. I know a lot of that stuff is generated on the fly, and thus can’t be directly link, but at least give directions how to get to your numbers.
Comment 8/4/2007
The first set of numbers came from table 6.2D - Compensation of Employees by Industry, lines 3, 87, and 92
The second set of number came from table 6.5D - Full Time Equivalent Employees by Industry, lines 3, 87, and 92
The third set of numbers was calculated from the above two sets. For those interested with the military removed, the numbers for federal employees are:
Total Compensation: $268,140m
Full Time Equivalents: 2,545k
Average Compensation: $105,360
Comment 8/4/2007
ok, thanks. interestng that these stats show that the 1.5 million members of the military receive, on average, about $102,000 per year in compensation That is a tad hard to believe.
Comment 8/4/2007
Don’t forget that’s compensation, not just pay. So for the military that would include health care, signing and reenlistment bonuses, and room & board.
I also would not be suprised if it includes the money they get for college education.
Comment 8/5/2007
I took a look at those numbers, and it looks like Kevin has the right idea, but in the wrong context. I calculated the percentage of total compensation each sector accounts for, and the percentage of FTE equivalents each sector accounts for, and what I found is telling.
In my calculations, I normalized my findings to 1, such that if a sector accounts for 10% of the total compensation, and 10% of the FTE equivalents, it would score a 1. 15% compensation / 10% FTE = 1.5, etc.
When you factor in total compensation (including benefits), the federal government (1.80) is the third-best sector to work in, behind only utilities (1.92) and corporate management (1.86). Four of the five worst industries to work in, however, are service industries: Administrative / Waste Mgmt Svc (0.64); Other non-gov’t service (0.61); Retail (0.60); Agriculture (0.56); and Hospitality/Food (0.42).
That bottom five accounts for almost 30% of the workforce, but just over 16.5% of the pie — cumulatively, they score 0.563. Retail, hospitality, and food service together make up nearly 2/3 of those workers in the “bottom five,” just under 18% of the total workforce.
So it seems to me that Kevin is right that something has to be done to improve the quality of service industry jobs, with these being among the worst one can have and yet becoming more and more pervasive; it’s just not civil service that needs such improvement.
Side notes:
Industries with scores closest to 1:
- State/local government (1.06)
- Transportation/Warehousing (0.99)
- Construction (0.96)
Best blue-collar industry: Mining (1.66) [skewed by the oil and gas industry’s 2.85 score.]
Worst white-collar industry: Education (0.70)
Best sub-sector overall: Securities/Commidities/Investments (4.05)
Worst sub-sector overall: Food services and drinking places (0.38)
None of those last four should be particularly surprising to anyone…
Comment 8/6/2007
Out of curiousity, what was the number for farming?
I’m wondering because the numbers for construction and warehousing at least seem to be inconsistent with the widely held belief that illegal immigration is driving down compensation in those industries.
Comment 8/7/2007
Stormy:
Farming is 0.56.
And I’m not sure how the construction figure absolves immigration; construction jobs used to be really good jobs, and now they’re just average.
As for warehousing, it’s part of the much larger “transportation” sector. Taken by itself, it scores 0.80.
And all of this of course assumes that my methodology is meaningful. Somebody with a better economic background would have to comment on that.
I can e-mail you the spreadsheet if you want.
Comment 8/7/2007
THE MORNING WILL COME WHEN THE WORLD IS MINE
Ask not what your country can do for you – ask what can you do for Hillary Clinton. I was a guinea pig at Hillary’s “think tank.” Somewhere, between Purgatory and the Soviet Gulag system, Hillary spawned the US Public Service Academy. The Duke lacrosse team fiasco shows that liberal educators have created a phony cultural paradigm that distorts reality. And, nobody exploits phony paradigms, obfuscates the truth, or games the system like the Clintons.
TOMORROW BELONGS TO ME
Set the Wayback Machine for 23 August 1995: a hot day in the nation’s capitol. But 3000 miles due west on the California Coast, a constellation of events was unfolding that would have a cataclysmic effect. Bill Clinton picked up the telephone. It was his Chief of Staff Leon Panetta, calling from a payphone in Monterey. Bill held the receiver at arms length and gazed at the tasteful floral arrangement that adorned the Oval Office. Leon’s disembodied voice filled the room. What now, asked Hillary. It’s that damn college, mouthed Bill. Hillary nodded; just tell Leon he’ll get whatever he needs. There was, no getting out: http://theseedsof9-11.com
Comment 8/22/2007