Jul 2 2009, 4:20PM
Is the White House a Poor House?
Via Noam Scheiber and Matt Yglesias, I see the White House has posted its staff salaries (PDF). As Noam notes, just about all the big players -- Rahm Emanuel, Robert Gibbs, David Axelrod, Larry Summers etc -- top out with salaries of $172,200. That's nothing to scoff at, but as Matt says it's
"hardly enough to put you in the stratosphere of the American economic
elite."
And that's true. Nonetheless, I think it's important to realize that a job at the White House has value that extends beyond those immediate six figures. There is, for one, status: the White House can get away with paying less because it's a tremendous ego boost to work for the White House. On a somewhat more crass level, there's also the expected future benefit: The presidency of Harvard, say. Or a job at a hedge fund. Or both!
And on a somewhat unrelated note, I see that 28-year-old speechwriter Jon Favreau makes $172,200, and 28-year-old assistant to the president Reggie Love makes $102,000. That's a lot of money by just about any standard.
Top salaries same as in the Bush administration but caliber of staff is not the same. There is a related post at http://iamsoannoyed.com/?p=2024
If you call White House a poor house then please let me know what you would call my house?!
I am a US citizen and a single mother of a born American teen ager. I hold a Masters degree in MBA in progress and have some knowledge of seven languages but with no job, no income, no saving and not even a black house instead of the White one!!!!!!!!!
People in America were no smart enough to see that to replace a white president with a black one can not solve their problems.As the matter of fact, they were stupid not to see that either the white or black president is merely the puppet of the rich guys behind the curtain. As a result of vote of imbeciles,the Economy toppled and the rich billionaire became richer and the poor penny picker like me became more miserable.
Well, even if we people see all but no one dares to complain or disagree due to lack of freedom of speech in this country and severe restricted law and punishment against the truth.
let's then pray on this 4th of July one day soon the magnificent US Constitution with its Freedom of Speech and the great Democracy comes back to their ruined nest....
Persia Barvarz
"And that's true. Nonetheless, I think it's important to realize that a job at the White House has value that extends beyond those immediate six figures. There is, for one, status: the White House can get away with paying less because it's a tremendous ego boost to work for the White House. On a somewhat more crass level, there's also the expected future benefit: The presidency of Harvard, say. Or a job at a hedge fund. Or both!"
I was going to write that this paragraph is obvious to the point of being unnecessary, but I guess it isn't when we have respected commentator Matthew Yglesias writing silliness like this:
"yet, these are some of the most important and successful men and women in Washington. Go to New York or LA or Chicago and the biggest of the big shots will be making 10 or 20 times that."
Another point: the big shots in other cities may make more money, but can they make their own wars?