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TSA acknowledges financial stress of shutdown is forcing officers to stay home

washingtonpost.com

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Re: TSA acknowledges financial stress of shutdown is forcing officers to stay home

#41

Post by moftz »

cascom wrote: post #22

While i don't envy their position - i think describing it as working without pay as a little disingenuous - while they have yet to be paid for the work they are performing, does anyone really believe that they are not going to be paid for their work down the road?

Congress already signed off on giving everyone back pay and I've read that they will be giving out a 1 day's pay and a $500 bonus to all TSA officers. It helps cushion the blow of having a $0.00 paycheck but it doesn't fix the situation. You have people not being able to pay rent and mortgages. The bank will be fine but a landlord might not be so fine, they will have to dig into savings to make mortgage payments. Thankfully the employees affected by the shutdown is mostly spread out across the country and not isolated to things like military bases where entire communities could suffer without paychecks coming in.

Re: TSA acknowledges financial stress of shutdown is forcing officers to stay home

#42

Post by muzika »

jmvoodoo wrote: post #9
kurczynski wrote: post #6

She said her fellow officers are “out there working, they’re putting their lives on the line. We took that oath when we got hired here, and we’re not even getting what we deserve.” All budgeting problems aside, how do TSA officers put their lives on the line?

Unlike most other forms of law enforcement, TSA agents lives are most at risk when off-duty and someone learns they are an agent in a social setting. As a result, the government shutdown is putting TSA lives in jeopardy.

lol so true!

Re: TSA acknowledges financial stress of shutdown is forcing officers to stay home

#43

Post by cascom »

ianleeclark wrote: post #37
cascom wrote: post #22

While i don't envy their position - i think describing it as working without pay as a little disingenuous - while they have yet to be paid for the work they are performing, does anyone really believe that they are not going to be paid for their work down the road?

> i think describing it as working without pay as a little disingenuous Disingenuous is taking this too far. They're paid in arrears, so the fact they've missed a paycheck means they've already done work which ought to have resulted in pay. They are currently without pay for labor they've contributed within the appropriate time-frame.

look i'm not saying they are in a desirable position, or that they are not entitled to pay that they earned, what i am saying is that if you asked a private sector worker which would you rather: 1. work without pay, but knowing you will have a job and eventually get paid (TSA) or 2. find out you no longer have a job and that you will never get paid for the work you performed (the private sector example)

Re: TSA acknowledges financial stress of shutdown is forcing officers to stay home

#45

Post by Rebelgecko »

dgzl wrote: post #27
Rebelgecko wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

TSA takes people's guns away on a daily basis. Eventually a passenger may not want to cooperate. I dislike airport security as much as anyone else (and because I opt out of the body scanners I've had plenty of undesirable intimate experiences with TSA agents), but their Instagram page is really enlightening. Sadly the guy who ran it passed away last year, but it's interesting to see the volume of contraband that peop…

An old project manager of mine flew with a gun once. It was entirely legal, because owning guns is legal, and flying is legal. It just had to be checked out and put away safely.

Flying with one in your carry-on is illegal for regular people. You can check one in your luggage but there's some special rules that sometimes the TSA and airline staff aren't familiar with (you must use a lock that is not TSA approved, you're not allowed to let TSA or airline staff borrow the key, stuff like that). The only time I traveled with a gun it was simpler (and cheaper!) to just mail it to myself.

Re: TSA acknowledges financial stress of shutdown is forcing officers to stay home

#46

Post by SilasX »

cascom wrote: post #22

While i don't envy their position - i think describing it as working without pay as a little disingenuous - while they have yet to be paid for the work they are performing, does anyone really believe that they are not going to be paid for their work down the road?

Not everyone has, or is able to (easily) have enough slack in their budget to endure something like this.

Edit: To adapt Keynes: the market for payday loans can stay irrational longer than you can stay solvent.

Re: TSA acknowledges financial stress of shutdown is forcing officers to stay home

#47

Post by threeseed »

Canada wrote: post #16
Rebelgecko wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

TSA takes people's guns away on a daily basis. Eventually a passenger may not want to cooperate. I dislike airport security as much as anyone else (and because I opt out of the body scanners I've had plenty of undesirable intimate experiences with TSA agents), but their Instagram page is really enlightening. Sadly the guy who ran it passed away last year, but it's interesting to see the volume of contraband that peop…

Remember before all the TSA nonsense, airports had metal detectors and xrays operated by airport security? Did they not also prevent guns from being carried on planes?

Isn't TSA just Airport Security ?

Re: TSA acknowledges financial stress of shutdown is forcing officers to stay home

#48

Post by chooseaname »

kurczynski wrote: post #6

She said her fellow officers are “out there working, they’re putting their lives on the line. We took that oath when we got hired here, and we’re not even getting what we deserve.” All budgeting problems aside, how do TSA officers put their lives on the line?

I guess they think they're law officers or something. They're more akin to security guards. I hate that individuals are not able to go to work and earn a wage but I really thing the TSA is full of themselves.

Re: TSA acknowledges financial stress of shutdown is forcing officers to stay home

#49

Post by ianleeclark »

cascom wrote: post #43
ianleeclark wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> i think describing it as working without pay as a little disingenuous Disingenuous is taking this too far. They're paid in arrears, so the fact they've missed a paycheck means they've already done work which ought to have resulted in pay. They are currently without pay for labor they've contributed within the appropriate time-frame.

look i'm not saying they are in a desirable position, or that they are not entitled to pay that they earned, what i am saying is that if you asked a private sector worker which would you rather: 1. work without pay, but knowing you will have a job and eventually get paid (TSA) or 2. find out you no longer have a job and that you will never get paid for the work you performed (the private sector example)

> what i am saying is that if you asked a private sector worker which would you rather

I was saying, regardless of whatever position I might take in a thought experiment, the US government has acted irrationally and violated an implicitly (and often explicitly) defined contract within our society: I give you my labor power, you give me cash. It currently stands that many government workers are without pay because that contract was violated and they have yet to be paid for their labor, so WP saying they are without pay is a valid statement.

Re: TSA acknowledges financial stress of shutdown is forcing officers to stay home

#50

Post by HarryHirsch »

delecti wrote: post #30
Cpoll wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm genuinely curious, myself. In the US, how many deaths in the line of duty are there (per thousand) for police officers, firefighters, and TSA agents, to juxtapose?

Only one TSA officer has ever been killed on-duty, and they have a total of 57,000 employees as of 2016 [1]. Not all of them are inspection agents (maybe 1/3? I'll use 20,000), but they've been an agency since 9/11 (I'll use 17 years). That makes 1 death per 340,000 agent-years. Admittedly I don't know how their total employee number has changed over time, and my 1/3 estimate could be wildly off. Meanwhile the statis…

It's worth pondering that the overwhelming majority of police deaths are injuries when an inattentive driver runs over an officer during a traffic stop. Only a suicidal maniac would stand for an extended time on the drivers side of a stopped car on the highway. It would be a boon to public health if the police could just photograph a traffic offender and send him the ticket in the mail! The police unions would be disappointed, though, because then they can't use the statistics to argue for their members, because felony homicides of police officers are around 40/year in the US. That includes Greater Methville.
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