I am not sure what the policy is on posting a news article like this. Do you think this sort of use of expenses occurs in the private sector and would it be tax fraud if it was? I always thought that the tax people were very stringent at auditing expenses, well so i have heard. Is it true that there is in some private sector industries, individuals with much larger salaries and with much more excessive use of expenses? Although the private sector I would say is within their right as the money came to them voluntarily. Where can you draw the line with public sector salaries and expenses, especially since the money is misappropriated? Do you think that this sort of culture of excessive expenses is systemic?
As there is no profit motive within the public sector, one they need to offer high salaries and excessive expenses to draw individuals to work in those positions from the profit based private sector where profit might offer incentive for the individual, two the costs associated or performance does not affect the actual salary or cash flow. ie even if it runs at a loss, they could still see departmental salary increases. But as there are no other competing fire departments the first one does not apply.