He’s not alone: AOC and others have argued lawmakers should be paid more in order to protect against corruption and make the job more accessible.
Congressional wages should be 2.13 per hour. They’re already heavily tipped.
I 100% disagree, but this is hilarious and I will definitely find myself repeating it. Good job.
What about the rest of us, who manage to scrape by on 60K or less after y’all have already taxed away a third of it? Where’s our relief you whiny shit? 💩
It’s about the market I’m afraid - someone with the attributes necessary to be an effective politician is likely to be able to use those skills to get a top management job in a big company and earn > 200k easily. If the gap between that and the politicians salary is too great then the only people who become politicians will have other strong other motives, which may be noble, but are often narcissistic or corrupt.
We run into the same issue with university professors. Especially with studies like economics, engineering or IT.
University professors don’t dictate national policy.
That’s not what they implied… And heck, they are the ones who teach the people who will eventually dictate national policies!
Seeing what supposedly educated politicians are saying, I have a doubt they attended a single class.
Bold of you to assume politicians are getting STEM degrees. Most don’t even understand the basics of computer networking.
Original text I replied to:
We run into the same issue with university professors. Especially with studies like economics, engineering or IT.Now let’s simply it for you:
It's an issue with ALL professors and especially the ones in economics, engineering and IT.What’s funny is that there’s plenty of politicians that study economics so that’s one field out of three that were mentioned, and the vast majority of politicians go to university so that’s covered in the first part.
To be fair, they do typically need staff that are paid by themselves. They need a residence in DC and their home state too.
Build them dormitories in DC.
Let them live in their cars like Americans, then.
Not legally possible afaik
Who makes the laws?
It’s not legal to live in your car in many places. No one cares about making sure that doesn’t happen in any other context, and we shouldn’t care when it’s the sociopaths who make sure wages stay low for everyone else.
They could easily change the laws to make it legal in dc
I meant because Representatives and Senators have a bunch of special rules around mailing and mailing addresses. I’m sure there’s another rule requiring them to have an actual residence in DC as well, not just a PO Box, for example.
Edit: Also you do realize that if politicians aren’t paid well by the government then all of their money will come from the private sector right?
I meant because Representatives and Senators have a bunch of special rules around mailing and mailing addresses. I’m sure there’s another rule requiring them to have an actual residence in DC as well, not just a PO Box, for example.
No one cares if anyone else can afford to maintain the minimum requirements for their job.
Also you do realize that if politicians aren’t paid well by the government then all of their money will come from the private sector right?
They already take bribes, and we already pay them too much. Every cent these pieces of shit earn that is greater than the minimum wage is an insult to everyone who works for a living in this country.
The staff aren’t paid out of the members’ pockets. They have a budget for running their offices.
Agree with your point, but man I didn’t realize 60k was considered “scraping by” now
If you want your politicians to be loyal to a country, you pay them. If you want them to be loyal to corporate interests, you let the corporations pay them. It is obvious the path the US has chosen. Contrast that with Singapore for an example of paying your elite government officials an actual salary and how corruption drops to zero.
You’re not wrong but it’s easy to mix up actual loyalty and being the highest bidder.
For many people it’s the exact same thing. And you absolutely cannot trust the public to vet candidates as has been proven over and over so only way to improve is to attract better candidates, and for that you need better pay.
We keep raising their salary. They keep getting worse.
It’s because the Supreme Court decided “money is speech”, which is so fucking stupid and logically flawed that it makes my head want to cave in.
“Speaking” is not subject to the rules of scarcity - given a supply of breathable air, water, and food, literally anyone could technically continue speaking indefinitely, both in a literal sense, as well as a written sense across various forms of transmission.
Using money under the auspices of “speech” IS subject to the rules of scarcity, and is a direct reflection of socioeconomic gaps in our society - that is, Musk or Zuck or Bezos or insert billionaire here have multiple orders of magnitude more “monetary speech” than pretty much anyone in the country - or, for that matter, anyone in the history of the human race.
Whereas in America, we could pay them millions and there’d still be constant grift. This country has lost any sense of accountability. Too goddamn individualist.
We already overpay them and they already take bribes.
The problem is you don’t pay them very much comparatively and so they take bribes and “gifts” to make up for the salary. Just look at Clarance Thomas. He said he needed a raise or he’d go full on corrupt. He did not get a raise. He went full corrupt.
Or we could, yknow, actually prosecute the corrupt ones. Likely a pipedream, but there is another option besides overpay them or allow blatant corruption.
Likely a pipedream, but there is another option besides overpay them or allow blatant corruption.
Yeah. We can do what we do now. Overpay them and allow blatant corruption.
The problem is you don’t pay them very much comparatively and so they take bribes and “gifts” to make up for the salary.
They do this no matter how much money we waste on them.
I hear your point, and it might be true, but it’s only a hypothesis because, in the grand scheme of things, they aren’t paid well relative to other work with significantly lower amounts of responsibility.
A young software developer working at Netflix or Amazon would be making more than them. A Congress person in a whole foods in silicon valley could very easily be the poorest customer in the store.
Scarface said “First you get the money, then you get the power, then you get the women”. I believe that this is the American dream, at least in the eyes of people who end up in high government.
Their path is different though, power comes first, THEN the money, THEN the women. If we paid them at least enough to enable sexy affairs, I think they could round out the three without as much incentive to go full on corrupt
I hear your point, and it might be true, but it’s only a hypothesis because, in the grand scheme of things, they aren’t paid well relative to other work with significantly lower amounts of responsibility.
“We should pay these corrupt pieces of shit even more money, and maybe they’ll stop taking bribes” is a hypothesis we’ve tested PLENTY of times. The results are conclusive: the people we put into office are overpaid at any price, and are corrupt no matter how much money we waste on them.
When has this hypothesis been tested in the USA?
Where are these conclusive results you speak of?
When has this hypothesis been tested in the USA?
Every single time we gave them a raise.
Where are these conclusive results you speak of?
They’re still corrupt.
We could enlist a corp of hot young women from all over the world , and bring them to a private island ….
They make deer $100k a year and have so many subsidies like for housing and travel. We could pay them millions and they would still take bribes. The problem is our economic model that puts money over people and our social values that puts power over people. And Singapore still has corruption!
$100k/yr plus benefits is nothing. That’s a junior engineer salary. You want the people guiding the way your entire country runs to be paid less than the UPS driver that hands you cat food in a box. Doesn’t make sense.
Pay politicians a salary that would make taking bribes useless and you’ll find they won’t. It will also attract better candidates. If you keep trying to elect bottom feeders for the lowest possible salary, you get what you have now.
you get what you have now.
A society designed by and for the sole benefit of the rich? Yeah, adding more money at the top surely is the answer, it must trickle down eventually, right? Right…?
Politicians aren’t “the top” economically, or even anywhere near the top. If they’re relying in their salary to pay their expenses, they’re working-class. Conflating politicians with actual elites leads to absurd conclusions.
$100k/yr plus benefits is nothing.
Minimum wage is 2.13 an hour plus tips. Don’t insult people who work for a living like that.
Not for anyone in the country since there’s a federal minimum. Don’t be stupid you lose all validity. And absolutely the barista at Starbucks doesn’t deserve the same pay as someone running the whole country. You have to be very stupid to not understand that everyone’s value of work output is not equal. Nobody with the skills to make more is making $5/hr. Not everybody has the skills. No matter how you want to pretend, humans are not all equal in their abilities. Try a fight with The Rock. Go head to head with Ken Jennings in Jeapordy. Go carve a marble statue. If you can do it the same way, cool. Chances are you can’t. And so you won’t be compensated the same way as someone who can. If you can’t find where you shine, you’ll never make much as your skills are mediocre at best.
100k/yr with the best health insurance in the country is a ton for how much time they spend working. The house works about 2 days a week and the senate works a little more than that.
You have zero idea how “work” works not in a service position then. You’re always working. Those dinners, events, and even interactions like getting food at a restaurant is working. That’s literally the point of a representative in a representative Republic going back to when the Romans did it.
100k/yr is a shitty salary for anyone in 2024 with a modicum of responsibility.
They’re the ones who determine their own salary, so if they think that $100k/yr is enough, it’s almost certainly way more than enough.
I guarantee you they don’t think it’s enough. But their whole schtick is to appeal to their base class, 75% of which make less than them and don’t understand their jobs. Giving themselves a raise when people feel the economy is poor (statistically it is not, but feelings are what makes politics, not facts) would cost them their job. It’s all a big calculus.
So you don’t take the raise, but you take the pork spending kickback. Don’t take the raise, but use your closed door information to trade stocks that doesn’t count as insider trading. They’re getting paid one way or the other.
You can really tell a lot about Lemmy’s demographics by looking at the upvoye/downvote ratio on these 2 comments. Of course 100k a year isn’t “nothing”, it probably puts you into the 10th percentile in earnings for this country.
In 2022, $100k/yr puts you in the 77th percentile. Having your ruling class be in the top 23% of earners is very low.
But $7.50 is apparently enough.
If only they were paid the federal minimum wage. They might be a little more in touch with reality
Then tell people to stop voting Republican 🤷♂️
‘Most of us don’t have wealth’
God damn it, he’s so close.
It might still be true that someone could be refused a top secret clearance if they had too many debts. The theory is that if someone is under financial strain, they’re easier to bribe.
As much as it might not feel good, it might be logical to pay congresspeople more, if it can be shown it makes them less susceptible to bribery.
And, while $174,000 seems like a lot, even someone like AOC thinks it’s not enough. One problem is that they’re legally required to have two residences, one in their district, and another one in DC. So, she needs to pay full-time rent on a place in DC ($2500 / month) and her district in NY (say $2000 / month). That’s $54k per year just on rent. I don’t know what the other costs are, but the people who get to congress who aren’t rich already often seem to struggle.
To me it makes sense that congressional reps be paid enough that they’re not under any financial strain. It means it’s harder to bribe them, and that they can focus on doing their job instead of on their personal finances.
Or…instead…why not just have a residence building in DC for various representatives? Why are they furnishing their own spaces? Just give them a dorm room for their term and have them clear out when they are voted out or reach term limits.
Do you want good representatives who are unlikely to be bribed? Or do you want desperate people who live miserable lives and would jump at the chance at some money?
Did you reply to the wrong person?
If they would become corrupt because they have to live in a dorm room when traveling for work, then they shouldn’t be given any power at all.
One problem is that they’re legally required to have two residences, one in their district, and another one in DC
They are not required to have a residence in DC, many members of Congress sleep in their offices to save money. There’s nothing saying they couldn’t commute to work.
Also, the House only meets for 4-5 hours, approximately 160 days a year, and they regularly skip sessions.
They are not required to have a residence in DC, many members of Congress sleep in their offices to save money
They’re not allowed to do that though. Most of them get away with it, but it’s against the rules.
There’s nothing saying they couldn’t commute to work.
From California?
They’re not allowed to do that though. Most of them get away with it, but it’s against the rules.
Do you have a source on that, because when I googled it the only thing to come up was Jackie Speier recommending banning it in 2020. There is even a recent Business Insider which talks about Mike Johnson doing it and makes no reference to it being against any rules.
https://www.businessinsider.com/speaker-mike-johnson-sleep-in-his-capitol-hill-office-2023-11
Here is a 2015 NPR article that says there are no rules against it https://www.npr.org/2015/12/26/458207661/meet-the-lawmakers-who-sleep-shower-work-all-on-capitol-hill
From California?
How about Arlington or Alexandria?
The building isn’t rated as a residence, so it’s most likely a fire code violation to use it as a residence. Aside from that:
squatters benefit from free utilities, cable TV and internet access, and cleaning services. This may violate congressional ethics rules, which prohibit members from using official resources for anything other than incidental personal needs. At the least, lodging on government premises should be treated as a taxable fringe benefit – in the same way that congressional parking spaces are.
So, while there isn’t a rule that says specifically “congresspeople may not sleep in their offices”, there are all kinds of rules about what constitutes housing in DC that are not met by congressional offices:
https://dob.dc.gov/service/dc-housing-code-standards
https://realestateinthedistrict.com/is-your-dc-bedroom-legal/
How about Arlington or Alexandria?
That’s still going to be a second residence, it may not be a $2500/month residence, but it’s not going to be free.
I have no type of economics experience, but what if representatives of a demographic of people should be paid the median wage of those people, with high punishment for corruption and bribes?
If they would like to earn more, they should lift their states’s lowest wages. This goes down to all levels, a mayor of a city only earns the median wage of the city. It is a civil servant job after all, it shouldn’t be glamorous.
This is a good idea in theory, but it doesn’t really hold up when you look at what we ask reps to do.
They have to maintain two households, basically, and have a lot of travel expenses.
State legislatures are a great sandbox to review how pay impacts the folks who can afford to hold seats. Turns out, the less they’re paid, the more likely they are to be independently wealthy. You will never “show them what it’s like” to be poor by paying them less - you’ll just ensure that actual normal people can’t afford to take the position.
I think it was Maine that had a fully volunteer legislature? And had the richest legislature ever.
Ultimately, this is another problem of America trying to retain an agricultural mindset (part time legislature so that everyone could go home to farm), despite the world having changed.
So if they have to keep up two household, let them have two average incomes. It would still be less.
The average income in Alabama is 49K per year. The average cost of living in DC is 78k per year. Representatives need to have a home in their district while also working in DC.
The best outcome of your change would be to limit being a representative to someone already rich enough to not need their salary
If not, since your proposal heavily prevents corruption and bribes, you’d be forcing the Rep to work a second job or be homeless
Representatives don’t need to own a home in DC.
The president doesn’t own the White House, it comes with the position and goes to the next person elected after they serve their term.
There is no reason the state can’t own property in DC that comes with use during service.
But that sounds like communist public housing /s
That’s actually not a bad idea in principal but would you want to live in a place after Matt Gaetz?
Congress should be paid based on a minimum wage factor and that rate should be locked for 20 years.
Exactly! Cause then “maybe” they feel a bit more inclined to care for the interest/needs of poor folks
I’ve heard this argument before, and I call bullshit.
Having more money does not protect you from greed, dishonesty, or susceptabiliy to bribes. Proof surrounds us, but you need look no further than Trump. Not as rich as he’d like you to believe, but born with a silver spoon in his mouth and certainly wealthy, and one of the crookedest, corrupt motherfuckers in the public eye.
AOC embarrases herself repeating that patently false position.
I 100% agree, if you’d take a bribe at $174k as a civil servant then you’d take a bribe at any price point. Raising pay doesn’t stop corruption, at best it just raises the price a bit. Trump was supposedly selling pardons for $2 million, he issued 143 pardons (let’s say he was only paid on 10% of those). That’s $28 million in bribes.
If we have to match the bribes to stop corruption then $28 million times 535 members of Congress is $15 billion.
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yes
Aww, did he forget to make sure he had five years of savings? Did he not make sure his retirement plan would be enough to cover his desired lifestyle once he no longer had a normal income? Perhaps he could pick up a part time job at the local Walmart to afford his insurance needs.
He really should have cut back on his avocado toast consumption.
Let me turn this around for y’all: how much would you pay politicians if you wanted to maximize corruption?
$0
Or, require payment from them.
Can’t they just do insider trading like the other politicians in the US? Gotta pull yourself up by those bootstraps.
Guess I’ll just have to take over the position, then, since I know how to live within my means.
Greed affects both the underpaid an the overpaid people tho
I mean, I make about the same and struggle to afford my house and two cars in California. My wife doesn’t work and we have a second baby on the way.
I wonder if this further incentives taking unsavory money?
I feel like they should get paid some function of minimum wage, to incentivise the lifting up of all workers instead.
