New Zealand's Unelected Officials Get Paid Too Much

Hello and welcome to what is, and will be, one of the hubs to access long form content from Caleb Brewerton's Real Shite. I sincerely hope you enjoy the content, and I will try to accompany most posts with a video. 

Here's one I made a while back, thanks to the recent inquiry into the Maunganui landslides, Marty's salary (and competency) should be up for question.

It's probably customary to state that this - being opinion - means these views may not align with my employer or organisation. Past, present, or future, these views are not a reflection of their corporate values blah blah blah... 

I am a strong believer in freedom of thought and speech, and that no one should live their life free from offense, so too will comments be left open for discussion. Who am I to dictate what you say online? 

Anyway, watch below for a full explainer on exactly how much Chief Executives, Mayors, Councillors, and other senior officials are paid.

In a lot of cases, having higher than average pay is fair, but some officials are earning 4,5,6, even 10 times the median wage of a kiwi - some are even higher. How does that benefit the public?

You cannot tell me that any government employee deserves more than three times the pay of the average person. There's no world in which you can defend them by saying they work harder! Or have more stressful jobs! Or we might lose them to the private sector if we don't pay competitively! Bullshite. As the public service commission states, we need those who are motivated by a spirit of service.

The very act of comparing the public and private sector is wrong, one is in the business of making money, and one is providing service to the taxpayer - though both aren’t trying to lose money. But somewhere along the way these two got mixed up. If you're in government, as a publicly elected official or not, you are there to serve the people. To make their lives better and easier. You're not there to line your own pockets. If anything, when the country is in a bad state and there's economic decline, you should be taking pay cuts. But while every New Zealander is feeling the squeeze, every public service leader's pay has been upping by thousands.  

So, If you’re one of these senior officials and disagree with me, feel free to reach out, I would actually love to hear your side of the story. Anyway, I think we should be calling for even greater transparency of costs across the whole leadership teams, not just chief executives. On a case by case basis each of these people need their pay reviewed and lowered accordingly. Some organisations need to be merged with others for efficiency, and saving money. But the question is, what do you think?