U.S. Reps and Senators have an annual salary of around $180,000*, which is in the order of twice the national median income. Why do you think they need to be paid more?
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*They also have a baked-in-statute annual cost of living adjustment, which is more than we can say for the vast majority of people in the country. Though they have voted not to take it for the last decade. (If they had, I believe the current salary would be upwards of $200K.)
> U.S. Reps and Senators have an annual salary of $180,000
$174,000, except for the Speaker of the House ($223,500) and the President Pro Tem of the Senate and the Majority and Minority leaders in both houses (all $193,400).
> which is in the order of twice the national median income.
Its almost 5 times the median personal income ($36K), and almost 3 times the median household income ($62K).
While this is true, I'm sure there are a lot of costs that eat that up pretty quickly. For example, you have to essentially have two places of residence, one in your constituency and one in DC. There are costs for family, travel, and other expenses that are personal and can't (or shouldn't) be charge through the government. I don't fully understand what they can and can't charge, but that gets chewed up pretty quickly if you break it down.
>U.S. Reps and Senators have an annual salary of around $180,000
Literally nothing for the stress and pressure they endure, I'm a designer who doesn't get out of bed before 10:30, at most works hard for 4 hours tops and earns $136,000 which I also think isn't much in 2021. Politicians deserve more but I also want them and their partners or children in solitary confinement for decades if a single one of them insider trades to earn more.
Pay politicians 3 million a year or even more I don't care it's a drop in the bucket compared to the millions they funnel through garbage charities, favors and programs just to skim cream off the top. Pay them an absolute fortune but the second they insider trade or try to skim cream solitary, lethal injection, firing squad I don't care. they're scum.
I don't think this in unreasonable and I'm happy to pay them an extremely competitive salary just for living within these restrictions and auditing their entire linage to make sure they are too.
At this point this is the only way I can envision honest government existing. Think I'm wrong? Google "Nancy Pelosi Husband stock trading" her husband is "earning" more than I'm suggesting just insider trading of her privileged information.
The average compensation for a member of the board of directors at an S&P 500 company is ~$300,000/year. Goldman Sachs pays ~$600,000/year. Senators and Representatives are paid $174,000/year.
I consider decision-making for the United States far more important than that of any one company in the S&P 500. Therefore, to be competitive, members of Congress should be paid at least twice what they are paid now.
Conversely, why does it make sense that the people we ask to make decisions governing the disposition of literally trillions of dollars get paid as much as a 24 year old starting at Sidley?
>U.S. Reps and Senators have an annual salary of around $180,000*, which is in the order of twice the national median income. Why do you think they need to be paid more?
This is less than a fresh college grad working at FAANG or Big Law.
Google starts around 190 [1], and big law starts at 205k [2]
I think this comes down to what incentives we want in place. Do we only want smart people who are willing to sacrifice income for public service. Maybe that is the case and this is irrelevant.
Maybe we should be considering the other types of positions they could’ve been entering. Consider the backgrounds of many of these people - they’re not high school graduates.
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*They also have a baked-in-statute annual cost of living adjustment, which is more than we can say for the vast majority of people in the country. Though they have voted not to take it for the last decade. (If they had, I believe the current salary would be upwards of $200K.)