Feds paid $430 million in bonuses
The federal government paid at least $439 million in employee bonuses last year, down $43 million since new austerity restrictions were announced.
The largest merit awards went to senior executives in Washington and air traffic controllers, an Asbury Park Press investigation found. The highest award, $62,895, went to 16 employees from agriculture to NASA.
The $439 million in bonuses may be a staggering amount — enough to buy the former New Jersey Nets, valued at about $357 million by Forbes magazine — but it represents just 0.4 percent of the $105 billion in salaries for most of the government’s civilian employees. In 2010, at least $482 million was paid in bonuses, according to federal data.
“This is the same president that criticized the banks for distributing bonuses when they were under — some of them involuntarily — government support,” said Grant Cardone, of Los Angeles, a regular commentator for Fox Business News. “Federal employees are already overpaid and coddled with pensions and a variety of benefits.... How many roads could have been fixed or people put to work with this money?”
$62,000 bonuses? For someone making under $200k?
http://www.app.com/article/20120514/NJNEWS/305140078/Feds-paid-430-million-bonuses?nclick_check=1
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