Way Too Many And Overpaid Firefighters

Posted: 9/8/2015

Trigger

Just read Fewer fires, so why are there far more firefighters?. The author makes a strong case that e.g. municipalities could save billions of dollars of taxpayers’ money reducing the size of their fire departments.

I apologize that I quote so liberally from the article above, but this article is well written.

Salient Quotes

Emphasis added:

1. “Rapid improvements in fire safety have caused a dramatic drop in the number of blazes, according to the National Fire Protection Association. Buildings are constructed with fire-resistant materials; clothing and curtains are made of flame-retardant fabrics; and municipal laws mandate sprinkler systems and smoke detectors. The striking results: On highways, vehicle fires declined 64 percent from 1980 to 2013. Building fires fell 54 percent during that time. When they break out, sprinkler systems almost always extinguish the flames before firefighters can turn on a hose.
   
   But oddly, as the number of fires has dropped, the ranks of firefighters have continued to grow — significantly. There are half as many fires as there were 30 years ago, but about 50 percent more people are paid to fight them.”
2. “It wasn’t until the mid-19th century that cities began establishing fire departments with full-time staffs, as the cost of firefighting grew and more training was needed to operate new steam engines. The size and complexity of structure fires during the era also demanded more professionalism. Almost all of the nation’s deadliest fires occurred between 1850 and 1950.”
3. “Firefighters responded to 487,500 structure fires across the United States in 2013, which means each of the nation’s 30,000 fire departments saw just one every 22 days, on average. And yet, taxpayers are paying more people to staff these departments 24-7. As a result, the amount of money shelled out for local fire services more than doubled from 1987 to 2011, to $44.8 billion, accounting for inflation.”
4. “Firefighters earned a median salary of $45,250 in 2012, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, but overtime can more than double that. In Los Angeles, for example, the average firefighter was paid more than $142,000 in 2013, including overtime and bonuses, the Los Angeles Times reported. Exorbitant overtime costs are fueled by union-negotiated minimum-staffing levels that often mandate four firefighters per engine be on duty at all times, regardless of the cost or workload.”
5. “So “fire” department has become a misnomer. In practice, these agencies have become emergency medical responders. The problem with that? Most communities already have ambulance services, whose staffs are less expensive and more highly trained in medical aid. Many cities mandate that their firefighters be certified EMTs, which requires about 120 to 150 hours of training in basic emergency medical care. That’s far less than the up to 1,800 hours of training for the paramedics who staff emergency medical services. Yet paramedics are cheaper than firefighters, earning a median of $31,020 in 2012.”
6. “Protecting a sizable city with a volunteer force is possible. Since 1930, the city of Pasadena, Tex., has used 200 active and 50 semi-active volunteer firefighters to protect its now more than 150,000 residents. If all towns up to that size moved to all-volunteer forces, the national payroll of career firefighters would be reduced by more than half. Using the median firefighter salary, municipalities would save more than $8.8 billion a year in base pay.”