{"id":139265,"date":"2019-06-13T18:07:10","date_gmt":"2019-06-14T00:07:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/?p=139265"},"modified":"2019-06-13T18:07:10","modified_gmt":"2019-06-14T00:07:10","slug":"representatives","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2019\/06\/13\/representatives.html","title":{"rendered":"Representatives"},"content":{"rendered":"<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Freezing congressional salaries, as inflation has slashed their income over time, while they must maintain two homes and work in one of the pricier cities in the nation, is a great way to ensure that only independently wealthy folk run for Congress.<a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/GAqcTYwN2p\">https:\/\/t.co\/GAqcTYwN2p<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; ***Dave Hill (@Three_Star_Dave) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/Three_Star_Dave\/status\/1139296138593546241?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">June 13, 2019<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Freezing congressional salaries, as inflation has slashed their income over time, while they must maintain two homes and work in one of the pricier cities in the nation, is a great way to ensure that only independently wealthy folk run for Congress.<br \/>\nhttps:\/\/t.co\/GAqcTYwN2p<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>We already have a problem with Congress being the playground of millionaires (of both parties); freezing congressional salaries (which has a knock-on effect on the salaries of aids, too) only makes this problem worse.<\/p>\n<p>Yeah, I know, <a href=\"https:\/\/news.gallup.com\/poll\/1600\/congress-public.aspx\">everyone hates Congress<\/a>. But we&#8217;re stuck with it as an institution, and the public always seems much more eager to vote out other folks&#8217; reps than their own. Given that, is Congress likely to improve if it&#8217;s only the realm of the independently wealthy, folk who don&#8217;t need to care about what congressional salaries are?<\/p>\n<p>Consider that working as a Representative or a Senator means having to maintain two households, one at the home district and one in DC. Yeah, being a congresscritter has a lot of perqs, but it also carries a lot of expense &#8212; something that &#8220;ordinary&#8221; people might not be able to swing if the salary doesn&#8217;t support it.<\/p>\n<p>Congressional salaries are supposed to include a Cost of Living Adjustment (COLA) to keep up with inflation and avoid arguments about Congress getting raises. But congressfolk who are (a) sensitive to optics or (b) wanting to be seen as fiscal hawks, as well as (c) not dependent on those raises &#8230; they&#8217;ve have kept that from happening.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Lawmakers have voted since 2009 to block their annual pay raise, which some are now trying to change this year since the cost of living has skyrocketed since then. [&#8230;] The Congressional Research Service estimated that, when adjusted for inflation, lawmaker salaries have decreased 15 percent since the last pay increase in 2009.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Again, you don&#8217;t like Congress? They serve two-year or six-year (depending on the chamber) contracts &#8212; feel free to give them their walking papers at that time if they aren&#8217;t doing the job you want them to. But choking off their pay isn&#8217;t going to make them any better &#8212; it&#8217;s just going to make them <em>less<\/em> representative.<\/p>\n<p>Which, y&#8217;know, kind of defeats the purpose.<\/p>\n<p><em>Do you want to know more?<\/em><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"list-style-type: none\">\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/thehill.com\/homenews\/house\/448438-lawmakers-push-to-permanently-ban-pay-raises-for-members-of-congress\">Lawmakers push to permanently ban automatic pay raises for members of Congress | TheHill<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.rollcall.com\/wealth-of-congress\">Wealth of Congress &#8211; Roll Call &#8211; Covering Capitol Hill Since 1955<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/List_of_current_members_of_the_United_States_Congress_by_wealth\">List of current members of the United States Congress by wealth &#8211; Wikipedia<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<p>Two notes from the Twitter comments:<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li>If Congress came with a housing stipend (adjusted for real estate inflation), that would cover much of my concern here.<\/li>\n<li>Alternately, if we built a Congressional Dormitory, I see sitcom gold!<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>If we don&#8217;t pay congressfolk enough, then only the rich will be congressfolk<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":135998,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[78,9,376],"tags":[723],"class_list":["post-139265","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-tweets","category-politics-law","category-taxing-spending","tag-nt"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/US-Capitol.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":131826,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2016\/10\/18\/donald-trump-the-ethics-in-government-candidate.html","url_meta":{"origin":139265,"position":0},"title":"Donald Trump the &#8230; &quot;ethics in government&quot; candidate?","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 18-Oct-16 5:51pm","format":false,"excerpt":"I have to give the Donald credit -- this is the kind of thing that will actually appeal to people without appealing directly to their baser instincts. Unfortunately, like most simplistic ideas, Trump's suggestions here are less than perfect.Yes, everyone wants to \"throw the bums out\" of Congress by imposing\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;~PlusPosts&quot;","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":134555,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2017\/09\/05\/trump-kinda-sorta-punts-daca.html","url_meta":{"origin":139265,"position":1},"title":"Trump kinda-sorta punts on DACA","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 5-Sep-17 3:40pm","format":false,"excerpt":"While there are serious arguments that the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program is completely constitutional, the program has always felt like a bit of a kludge that Obama felt the need to create through executive fiat due to repeated inaction and arm-flailing whenever Congress got close to any\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;~PlusPosts&quot;","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/jeff-sessions.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":15459,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2009\/07\/30\/a-great-health-care-idea-from-don-wildmon.html","url_meta":{"origin":139265,"position":2},"title":"A great health care idea &#8230; from Don Wildmon?","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 30-Jul-09 9:15am","format":false,"excerpt":"I get AFA Action Alerts in my inbox -- and this one caught my eye as having a really good idea nestled in it: Rep. Dean Heller (R-NV) offered an amendment in the Ways & Means Committee that would have required Members of Congress to enroll immediately in the government-run\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Politics &amp; Law&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Politics &amp; Law","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":20906,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2011\/05\/01\/unblogged-bits-sun-1-may-11-1730.html","url_meta":{"origin":139265,"position":3},"title":"Unblogged Bits (Sun.  1-May-11 1730)","author":"***Dave","date":"Sun 1-May-11 5:30pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Links (most recent first) that caught my eye, but did not warrant full-blown blog entries .... The High Cost of Low Teacher Salaries - \"In the next 10 years, over half of the nation\u2019s nearly 3.2 million public school teachers will become eligible for retirement. Who will replace them? How\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Potpourri&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Potpourri","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/potpourri"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":23331,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2011\/11\/01\/the-citizen-legislator.html","url_meta":{"origin":139265,"position":4},"title":"The Citizen Legislator?","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 1-Nov-11 3:41pm","format":false,"excerpt":"I suspect that there's always been a significant gap between the average income and net worth of Congresscritters vs the folks they represent. But it's a real issue in terms of their perspective on average citizens' problems, on legislation that helps themselves vs their constituents, on legislation that helps their\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;~PlusPosts&quot;","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"http:\/\/images0-focus-opensocial.googleusercontent.com\/gadgets\/proxy?container=focus&gadget=a&resize_h=100&url=http%3A%2F%2Fthinkprogress.org%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2011%2F04%2Fmoneybags-300x300.jpg","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":9622,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2006\/05\/24\/but_nobody_told.html","url_meta":{"origin":139265,"position":5},"title":"&#8220;But nobody told us we&#8217;d have our rights infringed!&#8221;","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 24-May-06 11:06pm","format":false,"excerpt":"After either rolling over or abetting the expansion of Federal power to investigate, search, probe, and otherwise ransack the homes, lives, and records of suspected terrorists\/criminals, with little or no...","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Politics &amp; Law&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Politics &amp; Law","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139265","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=139265"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139265\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":139271,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139265\/revisions\/139271"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/135998"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=139265"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=139265"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=139265"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}