about 10 years ago

[ThrottleJockey]

I can't believe what I am reading here.

Whether they are police, fire, or military these people put their lives on the line every day for YOU. And they do it at a less than stellar pay level.

If these folks have a pension plan that is taxpayer funded it is usually part of a collective bargaining agreement, a contract. Something else was given up in order to receive pension benefits, such as a living wage.

Would you still complain if we took away the pensions and just raised their wages so that they could contribute on their own?

Like it or not, every time you buy something you are contributing to someone's pension. Buy a car, pay your utilities, buy groceries, make your house payment....some of that money is going towards someone's pension. It is just not called a 'tax'. But you are still paying for it.

This argument is old and sophomoric. They don't do it for ME they do it for themselves, a paycheck, etc. They do it knowing the risk and the pay going into it. It is a choice they make since no one ever forced them to do it. I mean this is like saying I drive a truck for YOU so you can have food and other goods at market and I should get paid for it by tax payers even after I retire because of all the risk I take and the time I'm away from my family. BS I drive a truck to pay my bills. If I want a retirement fund I get to take it out of the pay I receive while I work (less than an LEO BTW). It's called budgeting and living within ones means. BTW, if you've got it, a truck brought it. So where's my money? I risk life and limb from the 80%+ of the people using the roads that lack the experience and skills do drive, from the weather, from having to park in unsafe areas with no protection because the state I'm in won't let me have any, from the cold or heat because I'm not allowed to idle my engine when I take my gov. mandated rest period...........

I choose this job knowing the risk going in. I choose it knowing what I will earn going in. No one forces me to do it. I do it for a paycheck. I do it so you can have things, EVERYTHING you have came on a truck, maybe mine. seriously, find an argument that isn't PURE BS. I can't wait until Mitch is done with the teachers union so we can get good teachers paid properly for the work they do, then maybe he'll go after the unions you mentioned so that we can get the GOOD cops paid properly and the rest stuck out with the trash on minimum wage. I see no reason that the best cops, teachers, firefighters, etc shouldn't be paid like rock stars or NBA players with million dollar contracts that they negotiate individually. At the same time I see no reason that the worst among their ranks should be paid the same, but rather should sit on the bench and get crumbs or find a different line of work.

 

[Dr_O]

Maybe you should become an LEO.

Better pay, better working conditions.

 

[public servant]

I can't believe what I am reading here.

You're new here, aren't you?

It gets better...wait and see.

 

[ThrottleJockey]

Maybe you should become an LEO.

Better pay, better working conditions.

I've considered it, but have no desire to force my control on others at the expense of taxpayers. I'm not a hypocrite arresting/ticketing folks for the same things I do daily.....Trust me, I spent my youth as a sheriffs explorer and have a lot of leo friends. It is not what I CHOOSE to do.

 

[Bunnykid68]

I have to pay into my pension fund too. It isn't 100% paid for by taxpayer money. Oh wait, yes it is because taxpayers pay my salary and therefore I don't pay anything to anyone, I just take from everyone.

Speaking of pensions, my dad receives $70,xxx a year from the Navy. Anyone going to ***** about that or is it just because this thread has anything to do with police that everyone's panties are in a bunch?

Im not wearing panties today....boxers

 

[rockhopper46038]

Thread fail. Yes, civil service pensions are out of control, but that isn't the fault of the civil service worker, it's the fault of the politicians that, in turn, we elect. There was one good point expressed in their somewhere, though; military members and civilian police are NOT the same, and if their actions were to become indistinct or indistinguishable, that would be a very bad day.

 

[longbow]

I did it because I was concerned with the lack of experience in the departments. When you have a heart attack, do you want a noob or a experienced person working on you.

or

on a tough police run, do you street smarts verses just out of training?

It worked out for everyone. I had fun when I told one of the elected officials how easy it was to trick them............

 

[Hkindiana]

" I see no reason that the best cops, teachers, firefighters, etc shouldn't be paid like rock stars or NBA players with million dollar contracts that they negotiate individually. At the same time I see no reason that the worst among their ranks should be paid the same, but rather should sit on the bench and get crumbs or find a different line of work."

Lets see, you are upset about pensions costing the taxpayers money, yet you think we should pay millions to the top performers? Where will THAT money come from?

 

[ThrottleJockey]

Well we won't be paying all the benefit packages for all the bad ones, they will negotiate a living wage if they are good enough, if they aren't they will make little or nothing and move on to another line of work. Additionally having the best of the best will eliminate the need for more and more and more....We will be able to have a functioning elite instead of a semi functioning MASS. And I have no problem with paying the money but expect to get what we're paying for. While many (most) are good and do their jobs well, the ones that aren't and don't are like anchors to the system wasting funds that could be used to pay the "good guys" what they deserve. Also those "anchors" lead to things like bad public image and what we have come to know as "cop bashing". I dream of the day when children trade "cop cards" or "teacher cards" or "fireman cards" instead of football, baseball and basketball cards.. I mean seriously, what do those guys contribute to society? What type of role models are they for kids?

 

[wrigleycub]

I don't know. Do you deserve a pension paid for with tax dollars? I have to pay into my pension fund. I go to work everyday. I do my job. Yes, there is a risk I could be injured, severely injured or even die at my workplace. So, do I deserve a pension paid for completely with tax dollars?

Thanks for asking a simple question, i guess i'll try to respond without throwing a bunch of hate speech out there. Do I deserve a pension, maybe, maybe not. I may not deserve one, but, the widows of J.C. Smith, Paul Jolliff, Jake Laird, and certainly John Lorenzano's daughter will tell you what we deserve. As for you, i'm not sure, what do you? Are you someone who works in a work force where being killed is a probability? If so then I would say, yeah, I think its a small token of what I could give you. I would say "please take some of my property taxes, I owe it to you" and "thank you". Back to that good ole tax payer pension. In my opinion I would love the opportunity to not be a member of the P&F 1977 fund. I would rather be able to invest that money into my own retirement fund that I established and set up. Which by the way, I have that also. I have to have that as a safe guard because I know that the 1977 will be raped and pillaged by the gov't as it already has before. Moving along, some posters on this thread really should educate themselves on the rhetoric they are regurgitating from Bill O'Reilly and Glenn Beck. The Indiana 1977 is not like the pensions they like to rail on. They are referring to the ones like California's fund (which I won't get into for sake of the length of this post). The 1977, I pay a fairly sizable portion of my (tax payer paid) check into it. Then I have to pay another large portion of my check into a Roth and a 457 (because I know that good ole 77 won't actually pay me when I retire). So lets break that down a little further, money from my tax payer check gos into a mythical 77, Roth, and 457. That leaves just about as much of my tax payer funded check to allow me the opportunity to work another full time job as a (for you throttlejocky) ding ding, truck driver. But, hell, I knew what I was getting into when I signed on the line to belly into a tax payers house with aerosolized diesel fuel floating around a large fire to help them.

 

[wrigleycub]

Well we won't be paying all the benefit packages for all the bad ones, they will negotiate a living wage if they are good enough, if they aren't they will make little or nothing and move on to another line of work. Additionally having the best of the best will eliminate the need for more and more and more....We will be able to have a functioning elite instead of a semi functioning MASS. And I have no problem with paying the money but expect to get what we're paying for. While many (most) are good and do their jobs well, the ones that aren't and don't are like anchors to the system wasting funds that could be used to pay the "good guys" what they deserve. Also those "anchors" lead to things like bad public image and what we have come to know as "cop bashing". I dream of the day when children trade "cop cards" or "teacher cards" or "fireman cards" instead of football, baseball and basketball cards.. I mean seriously, what do those guys contribute to society? What type of role models are they for kids?

Your all over the place, 1st you hate us, then you want to pay us like rock stars if we are good at our jobs. You need to roll that window down and get some air bub.

U.S. Population 300,000,000 legal residence, 200,000,000 illegals= roughly 500,000,000
Firefighters career about 275,000, volunteers about 875,000 boy these a*&holes are really contributing to this nations debt problems. I guess that means i'm responsible for pulling about 1800 idiots smoking in bed out of there house every year. And occasionally a couple of massive truck drivers who have to be removed from there trucks for various reasons (massive heart attack while eating cheetos, txting while driving and smoking 5 or 6 four wheelers, or just plain falling asleep and taking out the local church bus, just to name a few).
Truck drivers- about 4.5 million.

 

[down3green]

You need to roll that window down and get some air bub.

i'm responsible for pulling about 1800 idiots smoking in bed out of there house every year. And occasionally a couple of massive truck drivers who have to be removed from there trucks for various reasons (massive heart attack while eating cheetos, txting while driving and smoking 5 or 6 four wheelers, or just plain falling asleep and taking out the local church bus, just to name a few).

.

Wow, it sounds like you're kinda high on yourself. Talk about needing to roll down the window...


.

 

[IncendiaryGunner]

Your all over the place, 1st you hate us, then you want to pay us like rock stars if we are good at our jobs. You need to roll that window down and get some air bub.

U.S. Population 300,000,000 legal residence, 200,000,000 illegals= roughly 500,000,000
Firefighters career about 275,000, volunteers about 875,000 boy these a*&holes are really contributing to this nations debt problems. I guess that means i'm responsible for pulling about 1800 idiots smoking in bed out of there house every year. And occasionally a couple of massive truck drivers who have to be removed from there trucks for various reasons (massive heart attack while eating cheetos, txting while driving and smoking 5 or 6 four wheelers, or just plain falling asleep and taking out the local church bus, just to name a few).
Truck drivers- about 4.5 million.

Your numbers confuse me... your responsible for pulling out 4.9 people smoking in bed per day?

 

[ol' trucker]

Your all over the place, 1st you hate us, then you want to pay us like rock stars if we are good at our jobs. You need to roll that window down and get some air bub.

U.S. Population 300,000,000 legal residence, 200,000,000 illegals= roughly 500,000,000
Firefighters career about 275,000, volunteers about 875,000 boy these a*&holes are really contributing to this nations debt problems. I guess that means i'm responsible for pulling about 1800 idiots smoking in bed out of there house every year. And occasionally a couple of massive truck drivers who have to be removed from there trucks for various reasons (massive heart attack while eating cheetos, txting while driving and smoking 5 or 6 four wheelers, or just plain falling asleep and taking out the local church bus, just to name a few).
Truck drivers- about 4.5 million.

200,000,000 illegals? 1800 idiots you have pulled out of bed,smoking 5 or 6 four wheelers. all fails. you have got more stories than the highway patrol.

 

[wrigleycub]

Your numbers confuse me... your responsible for pulling out 4.9 people smoking in bed per day?

Just showing how many firefighters per residents. Yeah, I know i'm not responsible for 1800 anybody's. Just making a counter to the fact that there are "so many firefighters out there".

 

[wrigleycub]

200,000,000 illegals? 1800 idiots you have pulled out of bed,smoking 5 or 6 four wheelers. all fails. you have got more stories than the highway patrol.

Ol trucker, i don't believe I told any stories. But, thats o.k. keep on truckin brother!

 

[ol' trucker]

Just showing how many firefighters per residents. Yeah, I know i'm not responsible for 1800 anybody's. Just making a counter to the fact that there are so many firefighters out there.

Copy that. sound's more realistic.

 

[wrigleycub]

.

Wow, it sounds like you're kinda high on yourself. Talk about needing to roll down the window...


.

High on myself, do explain. I think like most others you may have read a little to much into any post I have made.

 

[Cherryspringer]

You guys deserve a good pension. But don't think you're the only one with a dangerous job. As a high voltage electrician the hazards are everywhere. Fall hazards, excavation engulfment, electrocution, percussion and most recently frostbite. You see what I'm getting at and we don't get anything for free. You leo's & firemen keep up the good work but think you're the only ones in danger.

 

[rambone]

Would you still complain if we took away the pensions and just raised their wages so that they could contribute on their own?

Yes, privatize. That would be preferable to the current system. Government shouldn't be responsible for anyone's retirement. Its an entitlement program. People should take their own money and put it in their own retirement funds of their choice. Taxpayers' obligations end the moment you get your paycheck. Not for decades into your retirement. Pay people a wage and let the cards fall where they may. The current system is great if you want to see your great country inevitably go bankrupt.