Federal officials at the time of the Gilded Age created the civil service as way to insulate government workers from the influence of politics. The Pendleton Act and the Civil Service Act of 1883 established the merit-based system, which ended the practice of awarding government jobs as political favors and led to the system that is currently in place.

But in the case of the IRS scandal, the very system aimed at keeping politics out of the civil service is helping the person who admitted to targeting tea party groups stay on the government payroll.

Lois Lerner, who headed the tax-exempt division of the IRS, was placed on paid administrative leave this week after she admitted to and apologized for the IRS's targeting of tea party groups. But the fact that she's expected to continue to receive her six-figure salary raised hackles in both parties and touched off a media sprint to explain why it is so difficult to fire federal civilian employees.

"There are fundamental incentive problems for why the firing rate is so low," said Chris Edwards, who is the libertarian Cato Institute's director of tax policy studies. "The taxpayers are paying for federal workers' salaries, but there aren't incentives to fire people—it's unpleasant firing people, but here in the private sector there's pressure for you to do it because you're losing money if you don't."


http://news.yahoo.com/why-hard-fire-low-...-171011126.html