Gibbs’ “Relatively Modest” Salary
[Guest post by Aaron Worthing; if you have tips, please send them here.]
So the other day, Obama praised Robert Gibbs as follows:
“He’s had a six-year stretch now where basically he’s been going 24/7 with relatively modest pay,” Obama told The New York Times.
Gibbs makes $172,200 a year.
Over at the linked article, people note the tone-deafness of this. But I just want to point out the math here.
So $172K is a “relatively modest salary.” By comparison, people making $250K are rich.
Well, glad he cleared that up.
Update: I barely finish posting this when I see this video of Megyn Kelly discussing the issue with a liberal tool who admitted that it was a bad thing to say, so his defense was… squirrel!
[Posted and authored by Aaron Worthing.]
So $172K is a “relatively modest salary.” By comparison, people making $250K are rich.
Isn’t that families making $250K, or individuals making $200K?
Ezra Klein redux (4f3ec1) — 1/7/2011 @ 6:20 pmGibbsie deserves a modest salary.
He is a fellow with modest talents who has much to be modest about.
Mike Myers (0e06a9) — 1/7/2011 @ 6:22 pmOops, forgot to switch back… I guess the explanation about “alot” confused me. Is it more than 100 years old, by any chance?
malclave (4f3ec1) — 1/7/2011 @ 6:23 pm“So $172K is a “relatively modest salary.””
A.W. – Well it is lower than the average cost of all those jobs Obama saved or created with the Stimulus Bill, so it is modest compared to that ginormous waste of government resources.
daleyrocks (e7bc4f) — 1/7/2011 @ 6:49 pm$172K in DC is a relatively modest salary.
Jim (8de501) — 1/7/2011 @ 6:51 pmIt takes me 7 years to earn that amount on my retirement income. So I have no sympathy for him whatsoever. It would be too funny if no one actually wanted to hire him. Not even for dog catcher.
PatAZ (537b43) — 1/7/2011 @ 7:20 pm““He’s had a six-year stretch now where basically he’s been going 24/7 with relatively modest pay,” Obama told The New York Times.”
Obama is wrong. Gibbs is grossly overpaid. You can find people to lie to your face for a fraction of what Gibbs is paid.
daleyrocks (e7bc4f) — 1/7/2011 @ 8:40 pmI think Obama is comparing Gibbs’s pay to the $317,000 his wife made in 2005, or to the $2.5 million Obama made on book royalties in 2008. This is the world in which the Obamas live, their pretentions of being regular folks notwithstanding.
And what would be a very happy ending is if Gibbs writes a self-serving memoir about his time as press secretary which no one bothers to read and which makes far less in royalties than he and his publisher expect.
JVW (4463d3) — 1/7/2011 @ 8:51 pmBut Gibbs is part of the elite ruling class, one of those who are smarter than everyone else who has the ability to make the world a better place for the proletariat, so he deserves more. He is more equal than others.
Constitutional lawyer (3d3f72) — 1/7/2011 @ 9:06 pm_________________________________________
So $172K is a “relatively modest salary.”
It is, to limousine liberals, including the people now in the White House. The types so very common in places like Manhattan, DC, San Francisco, West LA. The folks who bemoan “greed” and also stereotype Republicans as being money-grubbing, anti-tax elitists.
The worst thing about “LL” progressives is their cognitive dissonance, in which they themselves will do back flips, contortionist routines and the watusi in order to avoid paying a nickel more in income taxes than required.
Mark (3e3a7c) — 1/7/2011 @ 11:39 pmEven if he actually worked 24/7 that would still work out to $19.71 per hour! Nice gig if you can get it.
Icy Texan (8455ee) — 1/8/2011 @ 6:17 amLefties always attempt to reframe this subject under the risible meme of “but he would be making much more in the private sector,” which the radio guy here correctly points out is utter BS. Gibbs would have had to spend at least three decades of gratuitous bootlicking at the corporate level to even hope to attain the CIO position at the Fortune 500 – level. The only reason he’ll get any kind of job in the private sector is only because of his connections made in the gov’t sector – what a bunch of asshats.
Dmac (498ece) — 1/8/2011 @ 9:36 amSo $172K is a “relatively modest salary.” By comparison, people making $250K are rich.
No, that’s a $250K for a couple, makes you rich.
Gibbs is married to Mary Catherine Gibbs, an attorney
Does anybody think an attoney (with White House connections) makes less than $78K ?
They’re rich !!
Neo (03e5c2) — 1/8/2011 @ 9:41 amUh, gee, didja maybe consider the possibility that Obama was saying that Gibbs could have been making a lot more somewhere else, say Burson-Marsteller?
Larry Reilly (ae99e7) — 1/8/2011 @ 9:52 amNo, of course you didn’t. (Even though that clearly was what he meant.)
Wouldn’t fit your game. (Despite its being a hat tip to free enterprise.)
Compared to what he’d make elsewhere, the salary is indeed “relatively modest.” And that sort of thing is said VERY often about folks working at high levels in the government.
As a matter of fact, it is often said about the lower levels of government — at least it was until de-regulation and hyper-powering the bankers in an economy built on financial houses of cards crushed the private sector. It has made government employment look rather fetching, in a last chance kind of way.
Oh, sorry, I forgot that you guys believe the world’s economy tanked because the U.S. government forced banks to make loans to lying, low-income black folks buying homes they couldn’t afford. Trillions and trillions of dollars worth probably in Mississippi alone, right?
$172,000 really isn’t alot now a days, even in Georgia. When you takeout the Federal, State, FUCKA, Housing, Food, Private School Tuition(even if you try to save by sending your kids to the Pubic Schools you’ll pay more in tutors, self defense classes, shooting range fees)Electricity, Gas, Water, and you’ll still have to max out your credit card to get that 70 inch Pioneer Plasma Japanese Market model..
at least thats what I had to do when I only made $172,000, back in the last Millenium..
Frank
Frank Drackman (550e6d) — 1/8/2011 @ 10:09 amLarry Reilly has a “relatively modest” intellect.
Has he ever left a comment here that is not sneering and somewhat half-witted?
Patterico (c218bd) — 1/8/2011 @ 10:15 am_____________________________________
It has made government employment look rather fetching, in a last chance kind of way.
Actually, a combination of government-employee unions and sycophantic politicians has made jobs in the public sector quite fetching. They’re the ones who’ve regularly provided pay increases to workers at the local, state and federal levels and created super generous healthcare and retirement benefits.
I won’t even mention all the holidays, both minor and major, that government workers are allowed to observe — which cause many employees in the private sector to say “today’s a holiday?!! For what!!?” — and the good number of such workers who are allowed to retire well before they’re rather wrinkled and gray.
Mark (3e3a7c) — 1/8/2011 @ 10:19 amLarry:
I like your gross generalizations and insight into non-existent scenarios. They really make your points well.
Do you have a blog or newsletter where I can find more of your intriguing ideas?
Ag80 (e03e7a) — 1/8/2011 @ 10:22 amPatterico, not once that I can recall has he left a comment that wasn’t at best a bumper sticker style insult. Never seen even a half-hearted attempt at a coherent comment.
SPQR (26be8b) — 1/8/2011 @ 10:29 amp.s.
Larry Reilly (ae99e7) — 1/8/2011 @ 10:29 amI suggest each regular here chip in a dollar to help by dmac a clue. Apparently she works the counter in an auto parts store somewhere outside the beltway. She’s never heard of a conservative/Republican leaving government with the expectation of making more money.
As for Patterico’s comment: If it weren’t for ad hominem, you’d have no hominem at all.
Uh, per your style: You think that cute half-witted Christine O’Donnell should be in the United States Senate and you question another’s intellect.
Priceless.
Ah, further proof. Q.E.D.
SPQR (26be8b) — 1/8/2011 @ 10:34 amLarry,
you’ll make more sense if you stop posting with that Penis in your mouth.
Sincerely,
Frank Drackman
Frank Drackman (550e6d) — 1/8/2011 @ 10:38 am“And that sort of thing is said VERY often about folks working at high levels in the government.”
Larry – Not in the Obama Administration. Only 8% of his senior people have previous private sector experience, nimrod, the lowest level of the past 19 presidents. It helps explain why he is so clueless on the economy and health care, but you didn’t look at that, did you?
Joe Gibbs (e7bc4f) — 1/8/2011 @ 10:43 amPatterico, if Larry ever approached half-witted, it would be as refreshing as a spring breeze. His comments hover about the 15%-wit level.
Some chump (e84e27) — 1/8/2011 @ 10:44 amHalp! I am stuck in filtration.
daleyrocks (e7bc4f) — 1/8/2011 @ 10:45 am“Has he ever left a comment here that is not sneering and somewhat half-witted?”
Well, he’s usually not as drunk in the mornings.
daleyrocks (e7bc4f) — 1/8/2011 @ 10:47 am“Patterico, if Larry ever approached half-witted, it would be as refreshing as a spring breeze. His comments hover about the 15%-wit level.”
Some Chump – I agree. Half-witted would be a stretch therapeutic goal for Larry.
daleyrocks (e7bc4f) — 1/8/2011 @ 10:51 amThe only possible thing that could be said in defense of Larry’s posts is that they are usually grammatically sound and punctuated appropriately. There, that is my attempt in 2011 at being more tolerant. Beyond that, Larry is a jackwagon (thanks to R. Lee Ermey for that term).
JVW (4463d3) — 1/8/2011 @ 11:15 amI told a friend about this place, how much fun it can be. You just posit something rational that goes against the little mindset here, and they reach through the bars and fling their poo at you.
He says I should move up to the next level. He says go to a sheltered workshop and laugh at drooling people doing make-work, if I enjoy this kind of thing.
How could anyone possibly distinguish something as sneering and half-witted in this crowded little room full of just that. I’m sure you don’t recognize it if the sneer veers your way.
Again: A man who believes that Christine O’Donnell should be a member of the U.S. Senate just disparaged my wit and intellect. Tee-hee-hee-hee.
The monkey poo will hit the inside of the door I just closed on my way out.
Larry Reilly (ae99e7) — 1/8/2011 @ 11:18 am$172K is a “modest” salary, because it would be embarrassed if the general public became aware of it.
Gesundheit (aab7c6) — 1/8/2011 @ 11:20 amThe monkey poo will hit the inside of the door I just closed on my way out.
Wait! Is he promising to never come back? Oh happy day!
JVW (4463d3) — 1/8/2011 @ 11:24 amComment by Frank Drackman — 1/8/2011 @ 10:09 am
I imagine you could do quite well on $172K in Tbilisi.
AD-RtR/OS! (3ff3b3) — 1/8/2011 @ 11:37 amComment by Patterico — 1/8/2011 @ 10:15 am
AD-RtR/OS! (3ff3b3) — 1/8/2011 @ 11:38 amWelcome back to the world we’ve had to live in during your absence.
In Mawry’s world the glass is always half-full . . .
of shit.
Icy Texan (8455ee) — 1/8/2011 @ 11:46 amHas he ever left a comment here that is not sneering and somewhat half-witted?
Mawy Reilly is a little girl who reposts some political thingees she thought she read about in her recent edition of Highlights for Children. She’s also vewwy proud that she finally graduated from diapers – who’s a big girl now, Mawy? Why, you are!
Dmac (498ece) — 1/8/2011 @ 12:14 pmYou just posit something rational that goes against the little mindset here,
then this:
Oh, sorry, I forgot that you guys believe the world’s economy tanked because the U.S. government forced banks to make loans to lying, low-income black folks buying homes they couldn’t afford.
Mawy should look up the term cognitive dissonance, but I fear just reading that definition would blow her widdle head clean off…that is, it would blow her widdle head clean off once she removed it from her own arse.
Dmac (498ece) — 1/8/2011 @ 12:18 pmOf course it’s not clear that salary number is correct. Does it include Civil Service locality pay? Does it include senior executive bonus pay?
Probably not. I’d estimate his total salary for 2010 was probably over $250K plus health and retirement.
zdudey (907f46) — 1/8/2011 @ 10:55 pm