Monday, June 11, 2012

Why do people choose civil service?

I want to shake my blog up a little bit. I have more interests than writing, and I don't know many people who share my interest so I want to write about other things as well. On Mondays I will be exploring my journalism background, and writing about my opinions. I always wanted an opinion column - so here it goes.

I have a great respect for those who choose to go into civil service. Namely - teachers, police officers, firefighters, and military personnel. We need people who want to do these highly important jobs, yet we pay them probably half what they are worth. But then I started looking at the higher paid jobs and it wasn't as clear to me.
 Take a surgeon for example. They can make upwards of $400,000 per year which seems kind of extreme. But remember, they go to school for sometimes 16 years, and they work a minimum of 80 hours per week. They make a lot, but they work hard for it.

So then I thought about professional athletes who make into the millions. And really their jobs are like playing right? But if they can command that kind of money, and get it, shouldn't they pursue it? I mean no shoe company is going to pay a cop to have him advertise their brand. So if we don't want them to make so much money we would have to stop supporting them. Stop watching the games, going to the games, buying our ten year old $70 jerseys with a players name on it. The truth is we like the sports, and as long as we do, we are going to pay for it.

Another truth is that although civil servants are valued jobs, they don't take as much talent or training. A cop and a firefighter only have to go through the academy, though I have heard they do better if they have a college education. Though teachers have higher educations, they only work 9 months out of the year and have every break known to man. It isn't to say that they don't deserve more, but they have to demand it. In New York City they had a hard time getting people to join the police force so they upped their wages. If they couldn't get people to do it here, they would have to pay more. So my questions remains what motivates people to become Teachers, Firefighters, Police Officers or Military Personnel?

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