Here’s a story about a guy who was paid more than $30,000 per day by Massachusetts and federal taxpayers ($360,000/year salary plus sick and vacation pay divided by 15 days of actual work; his pension obligation may yet add significantly to a total compensation that is already higher than the President of the U.S.). His time sheets and other records were shredded by a friendly coworker, but his lack of attendance in the office was revealed by checking mobile phone records. An interesting unforeseen implication of technology.
http://www.chelseaha.org/About_Us.html still shows the guy as executive director of this agency that manages 910 apartments for the worthy poor. His compensation was approximately $600 per unit per year. Given that the minimum rent for a public housing unit in the U.S. is anywhere between $25 and $50 per month, this one guy potentially earned between 100% and 200% of the total rents received.
The link to the artticle is broken. You need to append html to the URL.
Correct link: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2075895/Housing-director-Michael-E-McLaughlin-worked-15-DAYS-360k-pay-check.html
It boils my blood to read a story like this. Doorman in my building works 12+ hours a day for 6 days a week + goes to school and the poor chap makes 1/6th of what this guy is making. Ridiculous.
Thank goodness we live in civilized nations where there is no fraud or corruption – unlike those dreadful Asian, African, and South American countries.
Or maybe they just don’t have enough shredders (yet)?
You have a doorman making $60,000 a year?
Of course, if they ask him to disgorge it, he will hire himself a lawyer who will claim that he spent many hours stuck in Boston traffic, and that his visits to Maine and Florida were business trips to understand the best practices used in these states to house the poor. As far as not being at work, I am sure he was busy loggin in via VPN, far in excess of the 40 hour work week.
I would be curious to see who are these “poor” that got the Chelsea apartments. Is it possible that they were handed out to his cronies or political benefactors for some low-rent subsidized living?
I remember reading somewhere (Milton Friedman, I believe) that if we wanted to help the poor, possibly the best way was to hand them cold, hard cash so they could decide where they wanted to live, and how they wanted to spend the support they receive. Anything else, and it just becomes a patronage vehicle with little of it reaching the intended recipients.
Curious that the article is in the British newspaper (tabloid) – not that I am doubting the veracity. Local journalists not think this is worthy of attention?
@Jagadeesh
After watching Reversal of Fortune where a homeless man is given $100,000 with no strings attached to turn his life around, I wouldn’t put too much faith in the “cold hard cash for the poor” strategy.
@jagadeesh
Cold hard cash won’t do anything to limit the patronage either. Other than the gifts will be cash instead of apartments. the way to fix these problems are actual audit and accountability. I would argue his boss should be fired as well, if we did that everytime managers would be more interested in where employees actually spend their time.
You’re right it won’t fix patronage, but its a lot more obvious where money goes, versus where assorted “welfare” schemes go. Its easier to hide patronage under non-money schemes. Plus, cutting checks is a lot cheaper than a housing authority, etc. with employees such as the one we’re discussing.
Zapiens: The story was broken by Sean P. Murphy and Andrea Estes at the Boston Globe.