There have been a lot of letters to the editor of the local papers about the cost of firefighters’ salaries, with some going so far as to suggest that this is one of the items on the city budget that is likely to lead us to a Detroit-style bankruptcy. The final straw was an op-ed in the Globe and Mail wherein Margaret Wente bemoaned the trend to becoming a nation of $100k firefighters, part of her argument centering on how cushy a job it is hanging around the firehall, doing 24-hour shifts where nothing happens and then going off to work another job so as to further feather the nest. I think she mentioned Owen Sound as a community that was bending under the pressure of salaries paid to these ne’er-do-well layabouts. I suspect that a certain amount of the local outrage is focused on anyone who has a better job than the complainer, or someone who feels that his property taxes just don’t represent good value for money. However, the jealousy and pettiness that underlines many of the complaints belies the worth of the work done by firefighters when called upon to get dirty, to get hot, to face fatigue and danger while working to save life and goods in situations where ordinary citizens are neither trained nor equipped to do the job. There is a certain amount of background noise, mostly emanating from some regional jurisdictions, but mostly from the provincial government, about the monetary value of work done by public servants in general, this coming from people, mostly politicians, who benefit hugely from the public purse, and who sit in the legislature for a miniscule portion of the year. I find it particularly appalling that citizens would call for the conversion of full-time fire fighting jobs to volunteer positions, implying that these folks should do the work for no pay. I would propose, rather, that those who perform volunteer firefighting duties be converted to at least part-time salaries, or perhaps some fee-for-call-out scheme. This should apply to all first-responders, ambulance drivers, first-aid attendants, auxiliary police, or anyone else who performs a valuable service for the community. Where do we get the money? Start taxing capital at the same rate as labour: with trillions stashed in offshore havens, there is a large pool of capital cannibalizing the work that people do without creating real value or building an economy where people willing to work can make a decent living.
(Photos are from the PAFD site)