I posted this on my Facebook:
“I’ve been seeing different posts about the pension, travel, office and so on expenses that a former President gets.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Former_Presidents_Act….
$219,000 a year for pension? And our average Statie does not a good pension? How many corporations have done away with pensions for people who have worked for their corporation for a good number of years? Who pays for that pension? Was it taken out of the President’s paycheck during their tenure?
And they call Social Security and Medicare entitlement programs? I can understand the pension but medical care and services? People have hard time getting medical care because COBRA, an individual insurance company (not provided by corporations/businesses) cost probably between double to quadruple the single, couple or family more in medical services than a corporate sponsored medical care. That is why more than 70% of the Staties support Medicare for All or passed Affordable Care Act (it is not Obamacare, the Congress passed and only labeled it to make a point) because medical care is a human right and capitalism has a place in government but not at the expense of human life.
Budget for office supplies, travel and transition processes? Wow. Once we leave our job, we are not entitled to the possessions that the corporation holds unless they were purchased by the employee themselves.
Secret Service is a luxury. The President is not a celebrity and they should have limited access to Secret Service. I am disappointed that Obama reinstated this as a lifetime service opposed to 10 years. How much money is going into the Secret Service and who pays for that?
If the Presidents have accrued a salary at their job for $400,000 a year, they can save that money for expenses after they leave the office, including Secret Service. I am actually disappointed that the Congress allowed this to be reinstated but then again, they don’t have term limits.”
And we wonder why we have issues with government control? Despite Republican’s desire to have smaller government, they have actually increased the number of Cabinets to include the newest Cabinet – Homeland Security, a department that was set up because our federal agencies couldn’t even communicate prior to 9/11. You know, office culture and policies can change, there’s no need for additional Cabinet to address that issue. It only increases the amount of money spent by taxpayers (mainly middle and poor as the wealthy’s tax percentage is one percent less than the middle class) on government operations.
I am getting off track. Main point would be out of control spending and it is not limited to Democrats, Republicans are also equally accountable as well as any other parties such as Libertarian, Green and even Independents.