I never planned to talk about my job online, but something’s come up that I cannot ignore.
Bad enough the “surplus” in the Public Service Employee pension was sucked out in 1998 – this surplus was owing to investments that resulted in more money than had to be paid out at the time – this money should have remained to cover lesser yield investment years – it would have saved taxpayer money.
But Harper wants to change the pension plan for new PSEs – this creates a two tiered system – a class system if you will, of employees of the crown – and that is unfair.
Please tell Harper to leave the PSE pension alone – per person, the MPs pension is far more costly – and they only have to do 2 terms to get a full pension
Harper’s one year first term counts as a full term – and if parliament falls when they FINALLY return, this last year will count as a second full term –
that means the MPS get a Full Pension for 2 years work?
seriously,
and he has the nerve to complain about mine? I have to work 30 years & pay into the pension to get it.
and his pension will be more than my salary!
Nina's Garden 
I guess that petition is gone by now. We’ve got a similar disparity here in the U.S. Our Congress members get a pension that equals their salary while they serve in Congress, which is simply insane, while the rest of us can only hope for some generally far less a percentage of our salaries. The above … a fellow getting such a huge pension after only two years of service … is abominable.
Yes, that petition was from 2010.
Government departments are not leeching bottlenecks on the economy.
Departments Like Industry Canada, Western Economic Diversification, Atlantic Opportunities and so forth, provide investment, networking and promotion of Canadian Businesses.
Service Canada administers a needed social safety net of EI, but also a means of employers to connect with employees.
Other Departments like Public Works, Transport, DFO – all provide infrastructure and safety services.
Other departments are licensing and regulatory.
Health Canada plays a critical role in drug approvals and disease outbreak controls.
Many departments actually are revenue generating through user fees.
Departments are not just a hand in your back pocket – business needs regulation – the recent financial crisis being the more recent example – but also environmental, labour and other areas where capitalism without checks and balances isn’t in anyone’s long term and for most, short term interest.
Our salaries come from a variety of sources – yes, some from taxes, from user fees and even fines from companies that break the law and proceeds of crime auctions by the RCMP.
The Public Service is not like the private sector, for most of us, there is no equivalent job in the private sector.
At the lower clerical levels, the salaries may be more than private equivalents, but the higher up the org chart, the lower the public salaries are compared to private sector counterparts.
Regardless of the source, we come to work, we do a job that’s needed and we are deserving of compensation for that work.
If the private sector employees don’t feel they are paid fairly in comparison, they can either demand better compensation for their work or maybe they should find out what it’s really like inside the public service.
It is entirely logical to expect to be paid your negotiated salary and receive benefits you pay into.
What’s not logical is having an employer with an unfair advantage of being able to legislate you back to work and rollback labour negotiations.