The Case of the $632,000 Education Attaché
A late April Washington Post item answers the question of why the UNESCO education attaché costs $632,000:
That includes the following: one GS-15 salary, plus benefits; one Paris apartment, plus parking; travel and moving expenses; education costs for children of up to $60,000; and $170,000 for International Cooperative Administrative Support Services, an expenses-sharing mechanism used by agencies for overseas staff.
I think there’s probably something to be said for the idea of a comprehensive review of housing allowance policies. In many cases, I think we pay senior civil servants too little. The government needs to be able to recruit top notch scientists, lawyers, economists, etc. so ought to be able to pay people something vaguely competitive with the private sector. At the same time, it seems to me that you could probably recruit well-qualified people for a job like this one even without the free Paris apartment.
49 Responses to “The Case of the $632,000 Education Attaché”
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May 7th, 2009 at 12:03 pm
I don’t know . . . how much does a convenient Paris apartment cost? Because it could easily take a huge chunk out of a GS-15 salary.
May 7th, 2009 at 12:14 pm
The government needs to be able to recruit top notch scientists, lawyers, economists, etc.
My experience is that the government pays pretty decent salaries to the scientists and lawyers they hire. I don’t know about economists, though. But if you’re paying education attaches GS-15 level salaries and giving them housing and education allowances, it’s clear that they’re being well compensated.
Government lawyers and scientists miss out on the side-benefits of working in private industry– eg, becoming a partner of a law firm, the ability to create a startup while you’re a science professor — but the base salaries aren’t bad and the jobs are both more interesting and less stressful.
I’m sure there are some less prominent parts of the government that require serious subject matter and executive expertise that, by nature of being less prominent and sexy than science and law, are undercompensated, however. Your mention of “scientists, lawyers, economists” is an implicit statement that these are the first things that come to your mind. They’re what comes to everyone’s mind, which is why those salaries are ensured to be competitive. It’s the parts of the government you’re less likely to think of that are getting less attention and less thought to attracting top talent, and that’s probably a big problem.
May 7th, 2009 at 12:16 pm
Civil servants who take jobs overseas typically have housing in the states to pay for as well. Housing in Paris would be very expensive, and while you should be able to get someone to move to Paris without paying for housing that would not be true for the rest of the world or even the rest of Europe. Positions for DoD civilians in Germany are classified as “Hard to Fill”, and without the housing allowance I think you’d have a hard time getting people to move there. Also keeping in mind the fact that most civil servants are not at the GS-15 level, but are making more like $40,000 at the GS-9 level. Added to this is the difficulty in navigating housing laws in foreign countries — something landlords renting to Americans sometimes take advantage of.
May 7th, 2009 at 12:19 pm
When my uncle did a sabbatical in Paris, he paid for his own apartment. But then again, he had a doctor’s salary. But even he couldn’t afford to live in a nice neighborhood. Paris was expensive back then, too.
May 7th, 2009 at 12:19 pm
I think Tyro’s basically right that there are less visible government positions that aren’t as well compensated. However, do we really need “top talent” to fill the Department of Housing and Urban Development’s position of Assistant In Charge Of Purchasing Toilet Seats? I don’t think so. Likely all we need is mediocre talent. And for that, we pay decent salaries AND provide very generous benefits.
May 7th, 2009 at 12:20 pm
My wife who is a VA psychologist and runs a PTSD program recently lost out on the chance to hire a really impressive sounding psychologist for her group because the VA wouldn’t pay $3000 in moving expenses.
I hate when I hear stories like this. That one about the Postal Service buying up employees million dollar homes so they could move a town over to take over a branch made me want to punch things.
May 7th, 2009 at 12:21 pm
A lot of the stuff, like education costs, is fairly unavoidable. You would need to send your kids to fairly expensive international school to get the equivalent of the quality available at very wealthy suburban high schools in America.
May 7th, 2009 at 12:23 pm
OT:
Hmmm. Looks like Kim, the climate creationist troll below, has not only been posting the same bullshit on this blog since last month, but has been posting the same bullshit for over a year.
As usual, Kim is either stupid or lying. She was corrected over a year ago …
… but, as is common with climate creationists, she keeps telling the same lie even when she’s been shown it’s wrong.
Typical.
May 7th, 2009 at 12:25 pm
One persons budget cut might be somebody else’s important, life-saving program. Somebody needs to talk to the Coast Guard and the FAA about eliminating LORAN-C, which is currently the only viable backup to GPS for boats, ships, and many aircraft. Also, I suspect the DOD won’t be happy either as GPS is very easy to jam, while LORAN-C isn’t. The rule in navigation is use multiple sources of information to cross-check and confirm. Always have one or more backups. You can run the entire land-based LORAN-C operation for a long time for less than the cost of one backup satellite for GPS.
May 7th, 2009 at 12:26 pm
Seems to me that the sensible thing, something that I know other institutions do, is to buy the real estate yourself and then rent it to the new hire, and then the hire after that, etc.
That would probably knock down the price tag considerably.
May 7th, 2009 at 12:27 pm
The government needs to be able to recruit top notch scientists, lawyers, economists, etc.
I think this could probably do with some further thinking and investigation. At a minimum, you ought to offer evidence that the government isn’t like, say, the academy, in which (I believe) people continually pick some other package over cash considerations. Maybe I’m wrong.
May 7th, 2009 at 12:27 pm
Tyro,
The gap between government and private professional salaries has been growing, however. I know lawyer salaries the best, and it is now the case that first-year associates at top law firms are getting paid much more than a GS-15, let alone midlevel associates with comparable experience levels. Add in growing student debt loads and the rising cost of housing in DC and other major federal cities (although maybe that is moderating a bit), and it is becoming harder and harder for the government to compete.
May 7th, 2009 at 12:28 pm
Positions for DoD civilians in Germany are classified as “Hard to Fill”, and without the housing allowance I think you’d have a hard time getting people to move there
I can echo that. My dad was a DOD civilian and starting in 1976 they starting kicking them out of USDOD housing areas and required them to live locally with housing allowances.
This was in the DM currency era and the allowance didn’t pay 100%. My dad was a GS 13 and the pay at that time wasn’t spectacular.
May 7th, 2009 at 12:35 pm
It appears that other countries — smaller ones, sometimes, but not always — have slightly smaller missions, or double up the UNESCO postings with other diplomatic duties (OECD, the main mission). My suspicion is that the Paris mission — like some of the other pleasanter capitals — has been offered as a cushy foreign junket to friends and loyalists. (Gail Randall, who held the post, was a journalist who became a Bush speechwriter in Texas and followed him to the White House.)
May 7th, 2009 at 12:36 pm
…do we really need “top talent” to fill the Department of Housing and Urban Development’s position of Assistant In Charge Of Purchasing Toilet Seats?
This is so right! We should really try to hire the cheapest idiots we can find to fill non-existent government positions. Are you available, Al?
May 7th, 2009 at 12:36 pm
As far as the government offering equitable salaries, in my experience (in science/engineering), government salaries are competitive with academia but somewhat below what you’d make in private industry, at the worker/technical level. The big disparity comes in executive salaries. Government salaries max out around 200k for the highest SES level adminstrators, well below what comparable executives make in the private sector.
May 7th, 2009 at 12:43 pm
It’s probably not a “free Paris apartment.” If you don’t give people somewhere to live, and they have to pay for it themselves, that means they have to go through the hassle of selling their house in the US, moving EVERYTHING or selling their furniture, and then probably, a year later, move everything again and buy a new place to live in the US. Who is going to volunteer to do that? There are a lot of positions in the government that are revolving positions (although this one might not be) and you shouldn’t expect a civil servant to go through all of the above motions because the government needs to fill a position. Is this position necessary? i have no idea, and i’m not in the position to given an opinion on it. But is the housing expense legit? In most situations in which it is offered, it is.
May 7th, 2009 at 12:46 pm
Matt-
If you even bothered to ask yourself why “it seems to me”, I would guess that the answer is that there’s some demographic of people that you subconsciously think would be well-qualified. As it is, this is just your opinion. Aren’t you supposed to be the educated philosophy major? What would one of your old profs say about this kind of “reasoning”?
May 7th, 2009 at 12:52 pm
$60,000 for educational expenses?
It seems like the govt already supports voucher programs.
May 7th, 2009 at 12:52 pm
Let me just echo pseudonymous’s comment at 14 above. To me the relevant question here is whether a separate UNESCO education attaché is necessary at all. If it is, $632,000 seems a reasonable price to pay.
May 7th, 2009 at 12:55 pm
The Republican tactic would be to re-name this article “The $632,000 Attaché Case” and ask why government pays so much for luggage.
May 7th, 2009 at 12:58 pm
My brother is an officer in the military. He gets nearly $1,200 a month in housing/living costs – and is based in a rural area where a nice place can be rented for about $500.
He’s saving (i.e. pocketing) almost $500 a month in just living expenses.
Not a bad gig.
May 7th, 2009 at 1:00 pm
The Republican tactic would be to re-name this article “The $632,000 Attachi Case” and ask why government pays so much for luggage.
Or to complain that we’re using a frenchified word for the job and demand we call them “Freedom Representatives.”
May 7th, 2009 at 1:08 pm
I have a pretty good private sector job, and aside from moving expenses, I have none of those benefits. Parking(!) and childrens tuition (!) aside, what’s the deal with the $170,000 for the, er, slush fund there?
May 7th, 2009 at 1:16 pm
what’s the deal with the $170,000 for the, er, slush fund there?
I’d imagine the $170,000 represents the cost of maintaining office/embassy space, security, etc. for the employee. The $632K represents the total cost to the Feds of maintaining the position, not the benefits to the employee.
As far as tuition and parking go, if an employer wanted me to move my family to a foreign country where English wasn’t the primary language, I’d certainly expect them to foot the bill for sending my kids to an English-language school.
May 7th, 2009 at 1:23 pm
I know lawyer salaries the best, and it is now the case that first-year associates at top law firms are getting paid much more than a GS-15, let alone midlevel associates with comparable experience levels.
How many hours does a GS-15 have to bill to be made partner?
May 7th, 2009 at 1:31 pm
Just to follow up further: the US rejoined UNESCO in 2002 (under Bush) after a long absence, so it would make some diplomatic sense to send a larger mission than might necessarily be needed, for the first few years, as a kind of goodwill gesture.
That doesn’t stop the overseas positions from being handed out as long-service or loyalty awards to favourites, but neither does it mean those appointees were just sipping pastis in the 8e during their postings.
My wife who is a VA psychologist and runs a PTSD program recently lost out on the chance to hire a really impressive sounding psychologist for her group because the VA wouldn’t pay $3000 in moving expenses.
Yeah, that’s going to be GS-13 on around $80k/year, but for people who have four-figure student loan repayments. I’m well aware of the VA recruiting drive to deal with PTSD, broken marriages, abuse/addiction; the loan-forgiveness scheme helps, but public-sector psychology basically doesn’t pay back the cost of getting qualified.
May 7th, 2009 at 1:33 pm
How many hours does a GS-15 have to bill to be made partner?
This many.
May 7th, 2009 at 1:33 pm
The education expenses are the biggest no-brainer in the package. There are very few English language schools abroad and while if you had a kindergartener you might consider the local schools, with a middle or high school student you certainly would not.
Another aspect of this is that it’s probably bad for the U.S. government in the long run to have government employees overseas running into money problems. It’s exactly the kind of thing foreign intelligence services could exploit.
May 7th, 2009 at 1:40 pm
I am not sure if the lawyer salaries being referred to here are only BigLaw salaries. Because MidLaw salaries are fucking crap.
May 7th, 2009 at 1:41 pm
And $60,000 in educational expenses is perfectly reasonable. $15,000 equivalent tuition per kid, plus lots and lots of ancillary expenses, $60,000 is a pretty good estimate for three kids.
May 7th, 2009 at 1:45 pm
Because MidLaw salaries are fucking crap.
Define “fucking crap” in the context of what you think a 26-year-old fresh out of law school should expect to make, compared to his peers the management consultants and medical residents.
May 7th, 2009 at 1:58 pm
I think “Fucking Crap” is defined as at least twice what a public school teacher with a master’s degree is making.
May 7th, 2009 at 2:04 pm
How many hours does a GS-15 have to bill to be made partner?
I’m not quite sure what the point of this question is supposed to be, but I will note that some government lawyers do in fact work fairly long hours. Not having to bill, though, can be nice.
In general, certainly there are ways in which government attorneys are rewarded that can make up some financial gap with private practice attorneys. The specific problem I was addressing, however, is that this financial gap is growing, both on the salary side and on the expense side. And that necessarily means the pool of people willing to take the financial hit is shrinking.
May 7th, 2009 at 2:08 pm
I am not sure if the lawyer salaries being referred to here are only BigLaw salaries.
I was basically referring to “BigLaw” salaries, both because ordinarily new federal government lawyers have those sorts of credentials, and because we should want them to have those sorts of credentials.
May 7th, 2009 at 2:08 pm
You’re obviously not familiar with ex-pat assignments. Every ex-pat who works for a multi-national company gets similar benefits, in most cases more generous benefits than the US govt offers.
You won’t get a single civil servant, qualified or not, to live in a place like London or Paris if housing isn’t covered and you’re protected from exchange rate fluctuations. And the American schools in London charge over $40,000 for one child. (Only grade 8 and up are allowed to attend, however. Others have to go to local schools, whereas non-US govt employees are usually able to send all their school-age children to American schools for free.)
Look up expat packages, which is what they’re known as. Many are quite generous, or seem so until you live overseas and realize how great expenses are.
May 7th, 2009 at 2:10 pm
I’m not surprised by those expenses listed. Think about it – an apartment in Paris probably costs a ton. Since the attache is American, he or she probably has to pay to send their kid to a english-language private school, so there’s your tuition, especially if there are multiple children. Moving expenses are moving expenses. None of this is surprising.
May 7th, 2009 at 2:16 pm
Every ex-pat who works for a multi-national company gets similar benefits
One friend of mine pointed out that you basically have to bribe people into taking ex-pat assignments because part of the cost of living abroad is the cost of being isolated from your professional colleagues and network, which can stall your career prospects. I actually had to turn down a very attractive scientific position abroad because the expense of living in a foreign city without a few inducments in the form of living amenities made it impractical, compared to what was available domestically.
What it means is not that the level of compensation is unfair, but rather than we need to be really, really sure we need to fill a position with a full-time expat posting, because doing so is very expensive.
May 7th, 2009 at 2:21 pm
Some numbers as a former Biglaw and Midlaw and current government attorney.
Biglaw associate: Starting at $160,000 and going up to about $250,000 over eight years. BUT at most places, there’s a 75% chance that you’ll be fired at some point between the day you start and the end of the eighth year.
Midlaw associate: Highly variable, but typically starting is about 80-90% of Biglaw, and raises are far less lucrative. I went from a sixth year associate at a Biglaw firm making $220,000 to a Midlaw making a market-adjusted $160,000 (actually a lot less, but in a far lower-paying market).
Government attorney: State will pay about $80,000 for a line attorney (AAG). Feds around $100,000 for the same. Usually at least three years of experience are required, and five is really preferred. At that point in their careers, a Biglaw associate would be right around $200,000, and a Midlaw around $150,000 or so.
Hours: Biglaw associate is right at 2200 hours billed/2700 hours worked (so 54 hours/week on average, which translates to 40 hours when you’re “slow” and 70 hours when you’re busy). Midlaw is at 1800 hours billed and 2700 hours worked — and yes, it sucks to be a Midlaw attorney, because you work just as hard except you do it for free. Government attorney is probably 45 hours/week — a touch under 40 most of the time, and then 70 hours/week during trial or when a big brief is due.
(As an aside, people think the main advantage of government work is the hours. That’s not really true. You work about 20% less than a Biglaw associate, but you get paid less than half as much. Not a good trade-off. The main advantages of government work are (1) no pressure when you’re not busy, (2) you typically get a lot of responsibility to handle really interesting work by yourself (in 13 months at the government I’ve already tried and won more cases and appeals than I did in 7 years of private practice, often in cases where I’m the only attorney working on it (but there would be four attorneys at my old firms)), and (3) a good pension, meaning you can live paycheck-to-paycheck and not feel guilty.
May 7th, 2009 at 2:37 pm
One friend of mine pointed out that you basically have to bribe people into taking ex-pat assignments because part of the cost of living abroad is the cost of being isolated from your professional colleagues and network, which can stall your career prospects.
True, that. Though there are times when it can be snapped up. Just got divorced, sold your home in the settlement, got no kids (or sole custody) and feel your life has been pulled out from under you? A couple of years in Foreign could be just the ticket.
That’s a big reason why expat communities are often a bit weird: you have people who don’t really want to be there, but are doing it for the money or because they drew the short straw, and the ones who took their jobs to get the fuck away from what they were doing beforehand. A bit like Alaska.
May 7th, 2009 at 3:07 pm
The housing allowance is largely justified by the fact that these jobs are not permanent jobs. The GS-15 who takes that Paris job knows he will be forced to leave in a few years. In all likelihood he/she has a home in the US that they will plan on returning to, and that they must keep up while living, temporarily, in Paris. If they can rent it out, fine, if not, they will be screwed if they are paying upkeep on two residences on a GS-15 salary.
Another consideration is the fact that the position is quasi diplomatic and, while not part of the job description, the attache will be expected to schmooze, which will mean entertaining at their Paris residence. For which they need a proper apartment.
As long as these jobs are temporary in nature and we insist that incumbents must rotate home to the states every few years, the housing allowance isn’t something you want to cut.
May 7th, 2009 at 7:19 pm
Adding on to what others have said, the housing allowance thing is a pretty big deal in capitals where the US has big missions (e.g. Paris, Geneva, Moscow, London). A “family” apartment of 2-4 bedrooms, with some proximity to the embassy, can easily run over $60K a year in such places, and as others have pointed out, there are some problems inherent in having people try to find housing in the private market — landlords know they typically have a captive, clueless market (although repeat business from an embassy is probably good incentive to stay honest). Beyond the possibility of dishonest landlords, however, US missions face the additional issue of security. Most low-level folks don’t need an actual security detail — especially in a place like Paris, of course — but the State Dept likes to have its employees live in places with a modicum of safety (and if you’re a relatively high-ranking person, the need for security goes up). Security is another reason for the $170K “slush fund,” a southpaw called it — basically, State divvies up the incremental costs of additional employees, like admin staff, office space, and additional security and interpreters. They may pad these figure s- I don’t know – but I think if you looked at what an additional mid-level employee costs in NYC or DC, for example, you might be surprised how much it is. (E.g. for office space, some fraction of an admin assistant, phones, computers.)
Another data point that may be worth noting is that I think (not certain though) that govt employees in foreign postings don’t get their “locality” pay, the adjustment they typically get for working in higher-price metro areas (which seems tied to housing prices). That’s a 23% bump above the base salary in DC, or 34% in SF. To put it another way, a govt employee moving from DC to Paris would take almost a 20% pay cut. As I say, I’m not positive, but if true, that alone would seem to justify some kind of housing allowance.
Matt, I’m surprised you didn’t point out how this kind of budgeting seems to give married people (or people with families) a ton more benefits than childless singles (or empty-nesters). The alternatives might discourage those with families from applying, but they might be cheaper for the government.
May 7th, 2009 at 11:15 pm
I’m currently looking at $32,000 in tuition expenses next year for 2 elementary-school kids…in Hanoi. Expenses for English-language schools in Paris are going to be very high indeed.
I do think that in Hanoi and many other third-world capitals, the carte blanche of diplomatic organizations to pay for housing is inflating the rental housing market for first-world professionals. If there were a joint agreement among all the payers (government and NGO) to appoint a bargaining authority for housing allowances, to try and hold local rents down, it might save everyone a little money and avoid economic distortion in places like Hanoi, Maputo and Lima. But this is pretty obviously not going to be true in Paris, where the effects of expat housing allowances will have no measurable effect on the real estate market.
May 7th, 2009 at 11:20 pm
That’s a big reason why expat communities are often a bit weird: you have people who don’t really want to be there, but are doing it for the money or because they drew the short straw, and the ones who took their jobs to get the fuck away from what they were doing beforehand. – pseudonymous in nc
In Paris? Um…yeah, and then you’ve got the people who’ve been working their entire careers in order to achieve what may be the most sought-after posting in their entire organization, because it’s one of the world’s greatest cities. Have you noticed a lot of UN diplomats complaining about being posted to NY?
May 8th, 2009 at 1:40 am
I was talking about expat communities in general, in reference to El Cid’s comments, and based on my own experience in cities that aren’t Paris but also aren’t Ulan Bator.
Diplomatic communities (i.e. the permanent foreign service) are different still. I know that British diplomats are nudged towards sending their children to boarding school if they’re at a point in their career when they’re still likely to be rotated on a semi-regular basis.
May 8th, 2009 at 1:42 am
Correction: it was Tyro @38 who talked about the potential disjunction of expat postings, presumably in the context of private business and not public service.
May 8th, 2009 at 3:05 am
Tuition at the American schools here, last time I checked, was $45,000 a year. That’s for one child, in dollars, and that was when the pound was higher. But you have to budget for a weak dollar as well as a strong dollar.
And our very middle class house near London costs upwards of $90k a year, and it’s a thirty minute commute into London, which costs $400 a month (not reimbursed). Utilities are comparable to those in the US, though they fluctuate a lot based on the pound. And petrol is about four times as much as in the US.
So yeah. Living in a Western European country is much more expensive than living in any US city. For single people, it might be a lark, but try moving school aged children every few years, and you’ll understand why you have to guarantee a similar lifestyle overseas as a professional would expect in America.
May 8th, 2009 at 8:19 am
“They may pad these figure s- I don’t know – but I think if you looked at what an additional mid-level employee costs in NYC or DC, for example, you might be surprised how much it is. (E.g. for office space, some fraction of an admin assistant, phones, computers.)”
Yep, “fully loaded” salaries, including overhead, are often twice the base rate or more. My job (outside Baltimore) has very basic facilities (old building owned rather than leased, no free coffee or other perks, only 1 secretary per 20 or so employees, etc.), and our overhead costs are still close to $100k per workyear. Given all the issues about foreign positings being expensive that have already been discussed, I don’t think the $170k figure is that unreasonable for overhead in Paris.
May 9th, 2009 at 5:43 pm
I also think, the government needs to be able to recruit top notch scientists, lawyers, economists, etc.