[buerkle]

"It provides a lot of jobs to people who are otherwise unemployable.", what a ridiculous and condescending statement. If that was true, the number of federal employees would be much higher but in fact the number has stayed relatively flat for over 50 years at 2.8 million federal employees. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CES9091000001

[gottorf]

I'm sure there are bright and talented government workers, but it's not a stretch of the imagination to say that a lot of factors make government employment cushier for some people than they might otherwise find in private employment. Or do you think the 60k employees of the TSA actually stop terrorist threats to commercial aviation?

And I'm not sure how your logic follows; there's no link between GP's claim that some government jobs effectively function as a form of welfare and your claim that the number of people eligible for this welfare must increase over time.