Paul Sassone

If by some gastronomic quirk you wanted to fry an egg on the sidewalk, you could. It was that hot.

The suffocating heat was just bad luck for the garbage man. He had his job to do.

Some of that job wasn’t too onerous — wheel the garbage receptacle to the back of the truck where a robotic arm would lift and dump it into the truck.

But then there were the items too large or heavy to fit in a garbage can — a six-shelf wooden book case, a pallet, chairs, an ironing board.

The garbage man had to wrangle these items into the truck on his own.

Some time ago the folks who run refuse collection companies, comfortable in their air-conditioned office igloos, determined it only takes one person (besides the driver) to collect garbage.

And that is what the garbage man was doing, alley after alley, block after block, all day. The job had to get done. It was a matter of public health, of public service.

Public health also is the job of another man. His name is Tom Price.

He is secretary of health and human services of the United States.

A physician and former congressman, Price was named to the health and human services post by President Donald Trump. He brings to the job all the conservative no-nos conservatives love — no gun control, no right to choose for women … you know the list.

And like all of President Trump’s cabinet, Tom Price is rich. His worth is estimated at between $13 million and $14 million.

But, who can ever have enough money?

Not Tom Price.

He has to cash in on public service. Since May taxpayers have shelled out for Price more than $300,000 for 24 flights on private jets.

Commercial planes are just so plebian, I guess.

Now, that garbage man I just spoke of also is compensated for his health and human services work.

Pay for garbage men (refuse collectors) varies from place to place, job to job. According to PayScale, a human capital firm that studies what occupations are paid, the average hourly rate for a refuse

collector is $14.96 an hour. Simply Hired, another survey firm, puts the average refuse collector salary at $43,000 a year.

A lot of work for not a lot of money.

But garbage men have the satisfaction of knowing that their fellow health and human services worker is comfy and cool when he junkets around the country.

–Putting the junk in junkets–