According to the Maryland Public Policy Institute, the average state employee salary is $47,313, while the average private sector salary in Maryland is $46,031. While this is probably an unjustified salary level, the real benefit of being a Maryland state employee is the 55% greater benefit package. The state employee receives $13,387 worth of benefits, while the private sector Marylander receives benefits with an average worth of $8,604 per year. Only West Virginia offers its employees better benefits in the region. Maryland benefits rank only 24th in the nation, however, so the situation in many other states is comparable.
In 2006, the state pension liability was $7.6 billion. In January of 2008, the unfunded pension liabilities had increased to $11 billion. Other post-employment benefits, such as health care, have a liability of $14.5 billion. Someday, the state will be under considerable tax strain to pay out these obligations. These benefits should be reduced now!
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2 comments:
I must say I enjoyed your introduction and about me sections. I sympathize completely with everything you wrote. I actually recently took the time to write down my understanding of philosophy, and it mirrored that of Objectivism, Logical Imperialism, and Darwinism. I even made the same reference to the Declaration of the Independence in much the same way.
It's been a very fascinating experience.
Sean,
Thanks for your comment. I am of the belief that Objectivism and the greater part of Darwin's theory of evolution are correct.
I do not have a good grasp of what logical imperialism is, though I tend to dislike the connotations of imperialism. At the same time, you may have a concept of logical imperialism which is something more than the name suggests. A quick search of the Internet has yielded a logical imperialism which has some components of national survival of the fittest or at least of the fittest practices being adopted or imposed on other nations. It has also yielded the phrase as implying a requirement to always yield to logic.
As one committed to the idea that reason is our only means of knowing and understanding reality and valuing logic as a tool of reason, the later form of logical imperialism I would go along with. I would never call it that, however.
The former form of imposing best practices on the people of other countries, I would not go along with. I would encourage them to use best practices and I would fight hard for a world in which free trade of goods, services, and ideas exposed those using weak and bad practices to ready identification as losers. One can argue that everyone has the individual right to free trade with everyone else. This means that no government has the right to keep any of its people from free trade with anyone else. If my government were to strongly support my right to free trade with everyone else, then it might strongly oppose many other government's restrictions on free trade, and many would call this an act of imperialism. I would not see such actions as imperialism.
Enough hypotheticals! Please feel free to explain what you mean by logical imperialism.
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