re: Are EMTs/Paramedics the most underpaid folks out there?

One vote for Baton Rouge Police Officers.

20 years on the job and I barley scratch 60k, which is drastically higher than the vast majority of cops doing the heavy lifting on the front lines with 7 or fewer years.

Elected leadership takes advantage of the resiliency it takes to be a career Baton Rouge Police Officer. Most, if not all of us, work 3 to 5 side jobs that pay market value to provide private security. You have to be a logistical wizard to make it with a family, balancing time away from home after your full time efforts to make enough to have more than the poverty level.

The running joke is that most people wouldn’t go down some of the streets we do in the middle of the night for all the money in the world. We do it for pennies on the dollar. It’s been that way since 1865 in Baton Rouge.

The 13% raise we received during two separate increments in the past two years helped dissolve the 9% inflation this country has experienced.