From: jovanovic-nick@cs.yale.edu (Nick Jovanovic)
Newsgroups: ne.politics
Subject: Re: Ignorance - Was Re: VOTE, BABY, VOTE!
Date: 18 Nov 1992 16:45:53 -0500
Organization: Yale University Computer Science Dept., New Haven, CT 06520-2158
NNTP-Posting-Host: zoo-gw.cs.yale.edu

In article <BxvqqK.MyE@world.std.com> cmr@world.std.com (Charles M Richmond) writes:
>jovanovic-nick@cs.yale.edu (Nick Jovanovic) writes:
>
>>> 					........... Just look at the salary
>>>that YOUR state represenatives are making ...  $75,000 is TOO MUCH for, what
>>>is for many of them, a part-time job.  Look at their voting records!  How many
>>>no-shows are there?  Come on!  Pay me that kind of money for doing next-to
>>>nothing, and I would at least make sure I showed up to vote ... And why should
>>>these people have their own bank, post office, etc.  Who the %$#^** are they?
>>>Let them use the same facilities that everyone else has to use!  The pay and 
>>>the perks are WAY TOO MUCH!  
>
>>If you showed the same disgust for corporate waste, then I might agree with
>>you.  Almost every bank I go into has fancy wood paneling, luxury furniture,
>>and fancy wallpaper, etc.  Most corporate headquarters I have visited are
>>like palaces, on the outside and on the inside.  Most top executives give
>>themselves unbelievable perqs, such as limos with chauffers, or even private
>>jets and helicopters.
>
>>-Nick Jovanovic
>>  
>
>
>It is pretty obvious that neither of you have expended much thought on these
>issues. The expenses and difficulties of running for and holding public
>office are such that $75k per year does not even put a dent in it. Many
>legislators go deeply into debt borrowing money to run a campaign and God
>help them if they lose and still need contributions!! (remember there is 
>usually at least one loser) They have to put up with every news hound and
>busybody sniffing around their finances and personal lives. Frankly I would
>not do it. Yes SOME of them are greedy , unscupulous and power hungry, but
>most are dedicated to their ideals , they are human beings and are subject to
>the ordinary weaknesses, but they have goals that they aim for and good 
>works that they do.
>
>As for the corporate thing: Would YOU choose a bank that was sparsely furnished
>and in a store front location?? Be real!   As for the perqs... I have used 
>both helicopters and limos when the situation required it and none of those
>situations were hedonistic. Typically the helicopter is for those occasions
>when I have a morning flight to Tokyo (back 3 days later) and I need to be
>at a customer's site to wrap up some project. I work straight through the
>night , catch the chopper to the airport at 7, land in Tokyo at 5pm the
>next day....  etc.  Most of those who get these perqs get them because they
>make sense for business reasons, when they don't make sense then the stock
>holders don't allow it. 
>
>Do people abuse their perqs, are some legislators corrupt... of course! Just
>not the majority of either.
>

I was not really intending to argue that politicians are compensated too
well as much as I was trying to point out a double standard that most people
seem to have regarding public vs. private pay and perqs.  I actually think
that public sector employees are in general undercompensated relative to the
private sector.  The problem is that there are too many people who get little
or no public OR private compensation.  That must change; until it does, perqs
in public or private arenas will be targets.  Ask someone who lives in a
broken down apartment house with no working toilets, no heat, and junkies for
neighbors what she thinks about the business value of your perqs.

-Nick Jovanovic
 
BTW, yes, I would choose a bank that was furnished with sturdy, but 
unextravagant, furniture.  One of my banks happens to be in a storefront
location! 

Newsgroups: ne.politics