We should change the law so that the raises only apply to new congressmen (Good luck getting that to pass!).
You get re-elected, no raise.
You serve for 30 years, you get paid the same salary as your first term.
I know that most are not in it for the salary, but it would still be irritating if the new congresscritters were getting paid more than them.
7 replies on “Congressional Salaries – They voted themselves a $4,500 pay raise”
Don’t use legislative accomplishment as their measure for pay. That will simply encourage them to pass even more useless laws that do nothing but add friction to society and life. Instead base it on their popularity rating with the public as a whole. If they serve their constituents well as deemed by their constituents…congress gets a higher popularity rating…if not their popularity drops. If congress’ approval rating is in the bottom quintile give them a 5% pay cut, every two years until they do the job to our satisfaction. If they all leave, no loss. If they want to keep their “jobs” they will do the jobs. Who knows, people might even pay attention to what DC is doing to keep them in line.
How about putting any salaries to a public vote? We haven’t had a functioning congress for decades and yet, they vote themselves raises every time I turn around. If put to a vote, they’d be more apt to actually do their jobs instead of the perpetual grandstanding and campaigning to get re-elected.
The problem there is if all these progressives can keep getting re-elected from San Fran, LA, Chi-town, NYC and so forth, while these districts continue to spiral downward, their constituencies will continue to vote them lavish salaries. After all, congressional pay is largely “other people’s” money, right? This would only work if 100% of Congress’s salary came out of their district’s tax revenues…
“This would only work if 100% of Congress’s salary came out of their district’s tax revenues…”
Now that sounds like a plan!
What’s wrong with tying Congress salaries to measurable accomplishment of the job they were elected to do? No budget passed this year, no salary until it is. Perhaps there should be a list of metrics by which congressmen are graded and their salary is dependent upon those metrics being completed. Other things that they actually like to do, like investigations of the opposing political party, should be restricted until the full menu of actual business is concluded. Of course, there would have to be protections written in so the party who is going to be investigated cannot stall the programmed work that needs to get done.
Maybe we can tie their salary to how many laws they can repeal. And no sneaky passing a law just so they can repeal it, either.
Nobody in government should get a raise unless they balance the budget. And it’s clear what they are cutting to make room for it. How is that not a law?