Ignoring the partisanship this argument doesn't make sense on its face: government jobs pay extremely poorly. You might say "well what if you hold more than one of them?", but you can't do that: a federal employee can be employed in two different roles, but their pay is capped at 40 hours a week across the federal government.
Anyone keen on that level of grift has vastly better options in the private sector.
There are wonderful people in government, I've worked with them. But there are a ton of people along for the ride and it's absolutely insane to argue the opposite given hundreds of thousands of government employees on cruise control. Plenty of folks would (and do) love a GS-scale gig that requires nearly no work and provides terrific bennies. They were never going to work for FAANG or another high-payer anyway.
And many of the people "in on the grift" are constituents, not donors.
The pay, job per job, is significantly lower across the public sector. You take a massive pay-cut. I don't know what lied to you and told you it's "cushy", but it's definitely not.
Also, you can absolutely be fired for performance. In fact, across the public sector probationary periods are typically longer than in the private sector. Meaning, it's actually easier for you to get fired.
These are the types of things people just sort of... make up... and then other people run with it because they like how it sounds and it reaffirms their ideology.
I've worked in government and it's just like the private sector. You have people that are there check in, make money, and go home, and you have people that care about their work. And I don't think there are any significant ratio differences between public and private in regards to that.
What I've said isn't up for debate, it's just true. If you find yourself disagreeing, please feel free to look up salaries and probationary periods. You will see you are incorrect. From there, you can decide whether to change your mind or continue to believe in lies.
> But there are a ton of people along for the ride
For someone who claims to be not in the startup hustle world of Hacker News, you also don't understand that people "along for a stable ride" is how 98% of the world views employment.