How would you like to have a job that pays you an annual salary, offers bonus money for extra assignments, provides a stipend to pay for everything from transportation to housing expenses, and gives you access to a long list of freebies ? like your own health club and social lounge? Sounds good, doesn't it? Moreover, what if you and your co-workers could get together at any time you wanted for the purposes of raising your salary or increasing your benefits?
Welcome to the world of the American lawmaker.
That's right fellow taxpayer; those who are supposed to be representing us on the federal and state levels are, for the most part, using their positions to set themselves up financially ? even as the middle and lower classes continue to struggle. The lawmaker's job is great work if you can get it. Unfortunately, most political races require individuals to be independently wealthy just to afford to run a campaign.
For the record, the United States Congress includes 100 senators and, when there are no vacancies, 436 representatives. The administrative branch of the federal government includes the president, vice president and 15 top-level cabinet executives. This is a total of fewer than 600 individuals responsible for leading a nation of more than 320 million. Most of them are doing far better financially than the vast majority of Americans. Let's look at some of the numbers.
Average Congressional Pay
The Houston Chronicle reported in 2012 that the base pay for a US senator or representative was $174,000 annually. In addition to that salary, members of Congress are eligible to receive extra pay for committee assignments and leadership positions. The Speaker of the House made $223,500 while the minority and majority leaders in both the House and the Senate earned $193,400.
That is quite a nice paycheck by any standard. However, it doesn't stop there. Members of Congress have access to a very generous pension plan, excellent health, vision and dental insurance, life insurance, and more. They can deduct a certain amount of their living expenses and they receive allowances to pay for a broad range of things, from staff expenses to travel. All in all, Congressional members are doing quite well.
We won't get into the numbers for the president, vice president, and cabinet members. Nevertheless, make no mistake about it; they are not hurting financially either. All of our top-level leaders are doing quite well. The same is true at the state level. While governors and state legislators do not necessarily earn as much as their federal counterparts, they are by no means poor. As an example, legislators in the state of New York earn $79,500 annually for a part-time job. The governor of the Empire State earns about $179,000 annually.
But don't feel sorry for the governor of New York, despite the fact that more than 1,500 state employees make more than him. The median U.S. household income as of 2014 was $51,000. Keep in mind that 'household' takes into consideration multiple adults both working to support themselves and, in some cases, one or more children. A household income of $51,000 between two working parents means they are each only earning $25,500 annually.
?It's Not Fair!?
So now we have some numbers to tell us how much our leaders are making. The question is how do they feel about it? Well, the U.S. Congress has not raised its own pay since 2009. Good for them. But they take up the question during every legislative session. And the fact is they only reject pay increases because they know voting themselves a raise would be political suicide. Rest assured they would do it if they could get away with it.
Comments made last spring by retiring representative Jim Moran (D-Va.) give us pretty good insight into how many of our government leaders view their financial compensation. Mr. Moran thought it fitting to complain about his $174,000 salary, saying in a radio interview that members of Congress were underpaid. He also said that he and his colleagues could not afford to live decently in Washington at their current rate of pay and that they, as the ?board of directors for the largest economic entity in the world?, deserved a raise.
Moran's comments met with understandable criticism, irritation, and outright anger. And well they should. First of all, legislators at both the federal and state levels are not directors of an executive board tasked with growing a business and earning money. In fact, the government is responsible for zero productivity. They earn nothing and take everything.
Second, our legislative leaders take great joy in criticizing corporate CEOs and other business executives because of their monstrous salaries. But then they turn around and compare themselves to those same executives in order to justify giving themselves a raise. Ladies and gentlemen, you cannot have it both ways.
Finally, the one thing our government leaders fail to remember is that they work for us. Every dime they earn comes directly out of the pockets of taxpayers. They are hired and fired by taxpayers at the ballot box. A government of ?We the People? is the entity that gives them their authority and provides them with a job. If our leaders want to compare what they do to the private sector, they must also recognize that employees do not set their own wages and benefits; their employers do!
Pay for Performance
If legislators, governors, presidents, and vice presidents want to be paid in line with private sector executives, I suggest they implement a pay-for-performance model. By the way, many American corporations would do well to adopt pay-for-performance as well. However, that's another topic for another blog post. Getting back to government, tying pay to how well lawmakers do their jobs would either drastically improve things or run the majority of the scoundrels out of town.
If I might, let me suggest a list of performance parameters we can use to determine the pay of our leaders:
- Deficit Spending ? Any business that routinely engages in deficit spending eventually ends up in bankruptcy. There is no possible way to continue spending money you do not have and still remain in business. Therefore, for every dollar our leaders spend in deficit, their pay should be reduced proportionally. For every dollar of surplus, their pay could be raised.
- Ethnic Standards ? What do you suppose would happen to a doctor who was caught engaging in an inappropriate relationship with a patient? He/she would likely lose his/her license to practice in that state. Even if moving to another state, he/she might still find it difficult to get another job. So why do we allow our leaders to routinely violate ethical standards with no recourse? Their pay and position should be directly tied to their willingness to maintain proper ethical standards.
- National Defense ? At the federal level, one of the most important functions of government is to protect the citizenry from enemy attacks, both foreign and domestic. A failure to do so is a failure to fulfill one's job responsibilities ? both for the Congress and the Administration. I propose that their pay be tied to their ability to protect us. Every security breach should result in a financial penalty.
- Economic Performance ? Every decision made by state and federal legislative and administrative bodies has some sort of impact on their respective economies. And that's by design. For example, our leaders in Washington are very proactive with fiscal policy designed to move the economy in whatever direction they see fit. Therefore, it stands to reason that their pay should be tied to economic factors including workforce participation, unemployment, inflation, GDP, and so on.
These ideas are things that will obviously never happen. So why mention them? The whole purpose of this post is to help readers understand that lawmakers are, by and large, in it for themselves. It is a truth many Americans do not want to face, but a truth nonetheless. Furthermore, we have no one but ourselves to blame for the mess we are in.
Complacency Equals Permission
The vast majority of Americans are unhappy with federal and state governments as evidenced by continually dismal approval ratings at every level of government. Yet nothing changes for the better. Why is that? Because we voters continue to elect career politicians with every election cycle. We are complacent enough that we do not really want to affect change. And complacency is equal to permission.
Furthermore, the change necessary to fix the mess is change that would require us to suffer somewhat in order to right the ship. Yet we would rather continue as is while making room for the occasional rant every now and again. We do not want to suffer even the slightest discomfort or inconvenience, so complacency is the only other option.
We the people could change things overnight if we had the collective will to vote every incumbent out of office and replace him or her with an individual who is not a career politician. Nonetheless, that is a scary proposition. After all, how could we possibly manage without the government elites running the country every day? I'm being sarcastic, of course, but that's actually how many Americans think.
Do you recall the alleged government shut down of 2013? Panic ensued throughout the ignorant masses of American voters who mistakenly believed nothing was happening in Washington. They were fooled by a media machine capable of convincing them as much. The truth of the matter is that the government did not shut down. The U.S. military continued its operations: welfare payments were still made; Social Security was not cut off. Moreover, even where the slowdown did cause problems and inconvenience, we all survived, didn't we?
We Americans do not need government as much as we think we do. Accepting this truth is the first step toward putting an end to government leaders who use their positions for their own financial gain. Rest assured that federal and state leaders would continue taking care of themselves, at our expense, as long as we continue believing we cannot exist without their help. The day we rise up and give them the boot is the day this all stops.
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