Whether in elected office, in appointed office, or in career civil service, anyone whose salary is paid for with taxpayer dollars works for the public.

On January 3, 2013, I stood on the floor of the United States House of Representatives, raised my right hand, and took the Oath of Office as the new employee of the 705,000 people of Pennsylvania’s Twelfth Congressional District.

Public servants include the president, senators, representatives, leaders of the various federal agencies and departments, and all Americans who work for local, State, or federal government.

As public servants, the fundamental principle we should embrace is that we are the employees and the people are the boss. That is the way it should work. Many public servants remember that fundamental principle and work hard every day.

It seems that with each morning paper, however, we read more disappointing headlines about the VA, IRS, and other departments and agencies in the federal government.

We learned in June that all 470 senior executives at the Department of Veterans Affairs received the two highest annual ratings of “fully successful” or “outstanding” over the last four years.

Not one executive received ratings of “minimally satisfactory” or “unsatisfactory.”

More than 65% of these senior executives received bonuses averaging $9,000.

This is unconscionable when you consider that hundreds of thousands of veterans have been forced to wait ridiculous amounts of time for their claims to be processed by the VA and veterans died while stuck on secret waiting lists at the Phoenix VA and other facilities.

At the Pittsburgh VA, systemic failures and mismanagement resulted in an outbreak of Legionnaires’ disease and the death of at least six veterans. Yet the senior executive in charge at the time did not think twice about accepting a huge $63,000 bonus.

The IRS targeted people because of their political beliefs and failed to preserve evidence. In the ensuing investigations, former top IRS official Lois Lerner and IRS Commissioner John Koskinen refused to provide transparency or accept accountability.

Unfortunately, some have lost sight of that fundamental principle of public service and believe that they are there to rule and the people are subjects to be managed.

We need to flip that paradigm to have any hope of fixing Washington, D.C.

Congress should lead by example. That is why I introduced the Congressional Pay for Performance Act. If Congress cannot complete it’s most fundamental purpose of budgets and spending bills, on time, they should have their pay withheld.

The House has worked to restore accountability and transparency in the federal government. Various House committees have conducted hearings and investigations into abuses in the federal government and my colleagues and I have also advocated for reform legislation.

President John F. Kennedy has always served as an inspiration for me. I grew up in a home with pictures of John and Bobby on the living room wall. We need a rebirth of the notion of public service in our country, harkening back to President Kennedy’s immortal words, “Ask not what your country can do for you – ask what you can do for your country.”

As public servants we must always remember that fundamental principle that we are the employees and the people are the boss. Working in public service is a serious responsibility and a tremendous honor and it comes with a trust that must not be abused.