TOPICS
TOPICS
Obama freezes pay for senior White House staff
President Obama on Wednesday announced that he will freeze the pay of senior White House staff making more than $100,000 annually in light of the nation's economic challenges.
The pay freeze, which would hold the salaries of about 100 senior employees at current levels, is part of a Jan. 21 presidential memorandum. "During this period of economic emergency, families are tightening their belts and so should Washington," the new president said.
While the memorandum did not provide specifics on how the pay freeze would work, it directed Assistant to the President and Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel to report back to Obama with recommendations for implementation within 30 days. The memo will be published in the Federal Register, Obama said.
"Many have accepted the call to serve in government and to assist me in restoring a sound economy and in improving the lives of average Americans," Obama wrote. "In this challenging economic period, it is only appropriate that senior officials on the White House staff forgo pay increases until further notice."
COMMENTS
- The President fails to mention that this also applies to yearly bonuses for those same employees. Plus, he already gave them a good salary to make up the difference in what they "may lose" if this does continue. You will never hear when he stops this program I bet. With the COLA increases set to be just 2% next year, it may go on for two years. takingit2easy@yahoo.com Posted February 17, 2009 9:33 AM
- How much money will this really save? How will freezing pay-raises of a few people improve the economy? This is fear mongering, and when people are afraid, they won't spend. I'll admit that it feels Good and seems fair to have the "rich" get pay cuts but, Donald Trump getting less money doesn't help my situation at all. In fact, getting pay raises will increase the likelihood of spending, which leads to more income for local businesses, which leads to more jobs, which leads to a better economy. What really needs to happen is the Federal Government needs to find out where it is spending the most and cut things in that area. The budget is only as strong as it's weakest spending link. We need to find the programs that aren't working and that are sucking up the most money and get rid of them. We also need to find a way to allow the average American worker to earn income with out taxes. let's do a little math: in 2004 the mean house hold income was: $60,528 This means that we brought home about $7 trillion. with average income tax being about 24.3% that means that the government took about $1.7 trillion. Hmmm, that's pretty close to the amount of the stimulus package that everyone seems to want. My question is if the Government gets that much money every year, why is it still in debt? Where is this money going? Imagine if we didn't have to pay income taxes. What would you be able to do? M Posted February 10, 2009 4:59 PM
- Again, this "freeze" is for White House Staff (political appointees, etc.) not for the "GS" worker. I too live in the DC area and make more than $100k (I am also a single parent with 3 children) "the 100K isn't that much to live on in the DC area - also, as far as being a "patriotic citizen" to the person that stated we can leave for other jobs or should take a pay freeze because we have "stable" jobs - well, I stayed in the government service just for the stability - I have made significantly less than my peers in my field (I make approximately 35% less) for the same work! So to state that we are not "doing" our part then obviously you have no clue on the pay parity between federal jobs and private sector. Current Federal Employee Posted February 3, 2009 11:31 AM
