And this is why no deficit reduction will take place.  Nobody is willing to eat their share of the sh*t sandwich.

Especially those evil 1%ers... they've only been carrying 40% of the entire federal income tax burden.  They need to do their part.  

$21 an hour?

That's GS-9 step 2 which is pretty unlikely. More likely a GS-7 step 10. Someone who's been doing that job for +20 years. The bitch is that you actually have to be a cleared person to clean the floors in our server room. You civilians can get away with hiring some fresh out-of-the-slammer crack whore but our cleaning ladies have to pass an FBI clearance which disqualifies most of sorts of people who clean toilets for a living. Something that the vast majority of folks here won't understand. They could understand it, they just won't.

I'd be willing to have ex-felons running around in my multi-million dollars data center but the regulations prohibit the practice. My folks are all mandatory reporters meaning they have a three page list of activities that they are required to report themselves on less the be fired/disciplined. The list is long and very inclusive and includes contact of a personal nature with any foreign nationals, travel outside the US, any debt, any contact with law enforcement (including traffic tickets), any drug abuse - including alcoholism, and the list goes on-and-on. Things that a civilian company would likely except the risk on but the federal government doesn't. Again, something most here aren't likely to want to grasp.

Our cleaning crew are cleared civilian contractors. The majority of them are wives of retired military members. The crew lead makes minimum wage plus a couple of bucks, the crew minimum wage plus a buck or two. Our guards are armed so there is a higher wage requirement for the gun qualifications but they too aren't making that $21 dollars in the story.

I have noticed what I call the +2 effect. That is if we in California would hire someone at a GS-7 ($16/hour starting) that at the DC area HQ that exact same position, or even one with a LOWER responsibility would be hired at the GS-9 level ($20/hour starting). Despite that our cost of living is higher than the DC one. When I fly back to HQ they think I'm a GS-15 due to my level of responsibility, my certifications, and my knowledge. No. There are more that ten times the number of the higher GS-13 to GS-15 positions there.

Yes, the vast majority of State and Federal workers don't make things to be sold at WalMart.

Pretty sure this is a dupe, but I'm lazy so I won't bother looking for the link.

My DoD level command has about 4000 people working in it. The highest managers are full 0-6 typically from the Navy and Army but with an occasional Air Force bird thrown in there. They're running a multi-nation, multi-million dollar "company" with 4000 technical and highly skilled workers. Those guys are make $140,000 or so dollars a year doing that. The local school principles are making more than that. The local mayor is making three times that. The top GS workers are our degreed engineers, our MBAs and they're making $62 a hour (legal maximum) which sure sounds a lot to those living in their momma's basements or the unemployed but the facts of my industry (television engineering/computer security) are that we're under paid by a bunch of tens of thousands of dollars per year compared to others working 20 miles away for what you people call Hollywood. Spending 20 years with your PE or MBA working for a company and you're only bringing home $130K makes you not successful.

I know the audience here thinks that we all sit in our cubical farms and play solitary waiting for our next pay check but honestly that's completely wrong at my DoD command.

[sarcasm]The overwhelming majority of the folks I work with are those asshole retired military shit-for-brains. They spend their +20 year in goofing off in Iraq and Afghanistan and the jump into a cushy job working for the DoD at 60% of what they could make commuting to Hollywood. Never having done a bit of real work in their lives they fall into federal service with that same attitude. They show up for work hours early sometimes and if shit breaks they'll stay on the job until it gets fixed - I've done 20 and 40 hour "days" when I've been fucking up so. They're so worthless that they do more work that industry standards by 150-200% servicing twice the number of clients that a normal helpdesk to tech ratio for the industry or manage 150% more servers to a higher mandated security standard that industry accepts. Worthless funking military shitheads, most of them with physical disabilities (like me). I have only worked for the one agency out of the 26 nationwide but it's first hand and accurate. [/sarcasm]

I've ranted here on that 1-2% that do not work like the rest of us, those who do the bare minimum of what's required of them. But I understand that goes on in the civilian world too as daddy hires his children to run the business or a union protects it's weakest link while forcing very low levels of production upon management. I visit ABC, CBS, NBC, PBS, FOX, Dish and DirecTV broadcast centers and interface with their management and workers ... we're far leaner than they are and our folks have a wider responsibility than the majority of their folks and from the job offers I've received from them, they get paid more. That's cool as our pensions are better but not half as good as say someone who works a state job or a teaching position.