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California Highway Patrol salaries

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Re: California Highway Patrol salaries

#41

Post by patrickgzill »

waterlesscloud wrote: post #35
SamAtt wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't trade jobs with a CHP officer either but I do have to wonder about the skill level. I'm sure it's harder than I think but the job still boils down to parking on the side of the freeway, spotting violators, chasing them for about a minute and then writing them a ticket. Is that really worth $48+ an hour? Because that seems to be around the average pay (The CHP has a very powerful union so their base pay hou…

It also includes being a first responder to accidents. And watching over the cleanup of said accidents. People burned alive in cars. Children strewn across highways. And knowing every violation stop is a potential end to your life. Who knows who that driver is and what they're going to do? Do I want the job? No thanks. They're more than welcome to those salaries for what they deal with.

True, however EMTs get paid less and see similar things, as do volunteer firemen earning $0 in my part of Pennsylvania.

FWIW in most areas police are statistically less likely to die a violent death than the populace at large.

Re: California Highway Patrol salaries

#42

Post by kprobst »

jister wrote: post #15

Isn't this sort of thing supposed to be confidential?

I think it's quite simple. If I'm a taxpayer in California, I want to know how my tax dollars are being spent.

Specifically, I'd like to know why a football coach is pulling in $2M a year while state employees are being threatened with furloughs and we're running the biggest deficit ever.

Re: California Highway Patrol salaries

#43

Post by jamesaguilar »

waterlesscloud wrote: post #35
SamAtt wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't trade jobs with a CHP officer either but I do have to wonder about the skill level. I'm sure it's harder than I think but the job still boils down to parking on the side of the freeway, spotting violators, chasing them for about a minute and then writing them a ticket. Is that really worth $48+ an hour? Because that seems to be around the average pay (The CHP has a very powerful union so their base pay hou…

It also includes being a first responder to accidents. And watching over the cleanup of said accidents. People burned alive in cars. Children strewn across highways. And knowing every violation stop is a potential end to your life. Who knows who that driver is and what they're going to do? Do I want the job? No thanks. They're more than welcome to those salaries for what they deal with.

> Who knows who that driver is and what they're going to do?

They're in much greater danger of being killed in an ordinary car accident than by a driver with murderous intent.

Re: California Highway Patrol salaries

#44

Post by jamesaguilar »

kprobst wrote: post #42
jister wrote: post #15

Isn't this sort of thing supposed to be confidential?

I think it's quite simple. If I'm a taxpayer in California, I want to know how my tax dollars are being spent. Specifically, I'd like to know why a football coach is pulling in $2M a year while state employees are being threatened with furloughs and we're running the biggest deficit ever.

The theory is that the football coach, via increased advertising dollars from a successful football program, is bringing a lot of value. Say what you will, but big college football programs pay for themselves, and then all the other sports at the college too. At least, this is what my brother, a college sports nut, tells me.

Re: California Highway Patrol salaries

#45

Post by bootload »

SamAtt wrote: post #23
modeless wrote: post #6

Wow this is weird, I went to elementary school with one of these guys and now I can look up his salary on the Internet. His 2009 pay is more than my base salary this year at Google, though I will probably make more with my bonus. However, he's on a very steep upward trend so his 2010 pay will probably be more than mine again. I don't think I'd trade jobs, though, police work isn't for me. (Edit: also just noticed tha…

I wouldn't trade jobs with a CHP officer either but I do have to wonder about the skill level. I'm sure it's harder than I think but the job still boils down to parking on the side of the freeway, spotting violators, chasing them for about a minute and then writing them a ticket. Is that really worth $48+ an hour? Because that seems to be around the average pay (The CHP has a very powerful union so their base pay hou…

"... but I do have to wonder about the skill level. I'm sure it's harder than I think but the job still boils down to parking on the side of the freeway, spotting violators, chasing them for about a minute and then writing them a ticket. Is that really worth $48+ an hour? ..."

Non verbals, body language, dealing with highly charged emotional people - all these skills aren't readily acknowledged but required to police effectively.

Re: California Highway Patrol salaries

#46

Post by matwood »

jamesaguilar wrote: post #44
kprobst wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's quite simple. If I'm a taxpayer in California, I want to know how my tax dollars are being spent. Specifically, I'd like to know why a football coach is pulling in $2M a year while state employees are being threatened with furloughs and we're running the biggest deficit ever.

The theory is that the football coach, via increased advertising dollars from a successful football program, is bringing a lot of value. Say what you will, but big college football programs pay for themselves, and then all the other sports at the college too. At least, this is what my brother, a college sports nut, tells me.

That is correct. The football and/or basketball programs at many schools support the entire athletic department. The schools can then offer many other sports that don't even cover their costs.

Re: California Highway Patrol salaries

#48

Post by Eil »

Elcho wrote: post #40
SamAtt wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't trade jobs with a CHP officer either but I do have to wonder about the skill level. I'm sure it's harder than I think but the job still boils down to parking on the side of the freeway, spotting violators, chasing them for about a minute and then writing them a ticket. Is that really worth $48+ an hour? Because that seems to be around the average pay (The CHP has a very powerful union so their base pay hou…

It obviously can be dangerous at times but considering how many people want to be police officers this pay level seems corrupt. This is just anecdotal but I've met far more people who want to be police officers / fireman than engineers or doctors; surely there is a large supply of eligible candidates, I can't believe that there is any shortage of capable labor to justify this almost CEO level of pay.

It's not to do with shortage of labor. Their salaries are high because being a cop is a life-threatening and potentially psychologically damaging profession. Some go their entire careers unscathed, some get killed, almost all have close calls every now and then. Most of them have families that care about them and know the sacrifice they might have to make one day. They deserve good salaries for their service.

Believe you me, I have many gripes about the quality (or lack thereof) of law enforcement in this country. But how much they are paid isn't one of them.

Re: California Highway Patrol salaries

#49

Post by poet »

patrickgzill wrote: post #41
waterlesscloud wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It also includes being a first responder to accidents. And watching over the cleanup of said accidents. People burned alive in cars. Children strewn across highways. And knowing every violation stop is a potential end to your life. Who knows who that driver is and what they're going to do? Do I want the job? No thanks. They're more than welcome to those salaries for what they deal with.

True, however EMTs get paid less and see similar things, as do volunteer firemen earning $0 in my part of Pennsylvania. FWIW in most areas police are statistically less likely to die a violent death than the populace at large.

To be fair, police have to deal with a wider range of psychological issues than jobs in rescue. Not only are police exposed to most things that rescue jobs are exposed to, they also have to deal with domestic violence, hostage situations, exploitation of minors and other disadvantaged groups, threats from organized crime, and sometimes actually pulling the trigger themselves. Hell, just the fact that police officers have to enforce laws they might not personally agree with is a pretty big emotional strain. My naive intuition is that rescue jobs are far less in a grey area emotionally.

I'm not saying this to quibble about whose job is more important or serious. It's just that I would volunteer as a firefighter or an EMT in a second, but I would have to think very carefully about how working in law enforcement would affect me.

Re: California Highway Patrol salaries

#50

Post by jerf »

waterlesscloud wrote: post #35
SamAtt wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't trade jobs with a CHP officer either but I do have to wonder about the skill level. I'm sure it's harder than I think but the job still boils down to parking on the side of the freeway, spotting violators, chasing them for about a minute and then writing them a ticket. Is that really worth $48+ an hour? Because that seems to be around the average pay (The CHP has a very powerful union so their base pay hou…

It also includes being a first responder to accidents. And watching over the cleanup of said accidents. People burned alive in cars. Children strewn across highways. And knowing every violation stop is a potential end to your life. Who knows who that driver is and what they're going to do? Do I want the job? No thanks. They're more than welcome to those salaries for what they deal with.

Pay is not determined by the difficulty or unpleasantness of the job, or at least, not directly. It is determined by the balance of supply and demand. How many people are ready and willing to be police officers at some level of pay, and how many police officers are needed?

Policing isn't trivial, but you know what? Neither are most other jobs. There are many, many people with the capability of being police officers; supply is high. Demand is not actually all that high compared to supply. There's even more supply than may initially meet the eye because many people not physically strong enough to be police officers right this instant could bring themselves up to spec if needed. The difficulty or unpleasantness of the job factors into the supply but I think you'd find a lot of people who would take that job; it's hard, but there's a lot of hard jobs about that people do for much less than that amount of money. (After all, first responding is hard from one point of view, but it is uniquely rewarding too; how many lives have you saved in the course of your work? It's not all good but it's not all bad either.)

You argue that they are valuable, and this is true, but the value of an employee is not what determines their pay... it is what caps it; long term, anyhow. You can't be paid more than what you are worth, you can't even be paid exactly what you are worth, you in fact inevitably must be paid less than what you are "worth" for the whole arrangement to work. Governments aren't immune to this. They must run at a net profit or they'll bring their society down. Measurement of profit is somewhat different than a private company, but profit they must; they must be extracting more value from their employees than they are paying their employees or the society is running the government at a net loss, which can only be tolerated to a finite degree as determined by what other surpluses the society is running elsewhere. What governments can do that private industry can't is put off the pain until much later before the fact they are paying people more than the value they are actually bringing bites them.

Later's pretty much here, by the way.

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