Congress gets third pay raise in 4 years

Defenders say the raise is well-deserved - too small, if anything. Critics call it excessive, not to mention ill-timed during recession and war. But on one thing, many on both sides agree: The way the raise came about stinks.

Under a complex system approved in 1989, many congressional pay raises are automatic unless Congress acts to block them - a debate that often plays out in the dead of night.

"It looks bad. It smells bad. It hurts Congress in the eyes of the public," said Paul Light, a Brookings Institution expert on government who nonetheless thinks legislators are underpaid. "They are terrified of pay increases. They always have been," said Light.

Not scared enough to suit Gary Ruskin, director of the nonprofit Congressional Accountability Project, one of a number of watchdog groups that oppose the raise.

He points to the steady upward march of congressional pay in recent years, from $98,400 in 1990 to $150,000 come January.

As for the coming raise, he says: "This is an effort by some of the most greedy people on the planet to stuff more taxpayers' money into their own wallets. The bipartisan greed caucus is alive and well."

Although statistics are hard to come by, pay raise defenders say that legislators are paid considerably less than those who do equivalent work for private companies, yet lawmakers have many extra expenses, such as maintaining homes in Washington and their districts.

They also say that since congressional pay rates affect the salaries for federal judges and other senior government officials, pay for others in government also is being kept too low.

The whole idea behind tying congressional pay to that of others in government was to give legislators some political cover to raise their own salaries, he said.

But in reality, "Congress still shies from needed pay increases, and these other positions are lagging," Light said.

Critics insist that it's wrong to compare legislators' pay with that of their counterparts in business. "The purpose of the private sector is to earn money for shareholders," said Ruskin. "The purpose of the public sector is to do the public's will."

Furthermore, critics point to congressional perquisites, such as a generous pension plan, that create a "princely" compensation package. And they argue that now is the time to forego a raise to show solidarity with struggling Americans.

...yet lawmakers have many extra expenses, such as maintaining homes in Washington and their districts....

Bullsh!t. Bogus effing complaint. All these blankety-blanks knew the inherent expenses when they applied for the jobs. Here's the cure for that argument. Require each state to purchase and maintain a residence for each of its representatives in Washington, DC. The individual representatives could live on the State "campus" free of charge, or where ever else they wished at their own personal expense.

Each state's costs would be proportional to its representation in Washington. Each state could choose as frugal or opulent living standards as the state representatives believed their constituents would support. That such a plan has, to this date, never been adopted is testimony to the fact that those in Washington truly consider themselves our rulers instead of our representatives because it speaks to their sense of entitlement as a perque of the office.

Let me see if I understand this....Tom Daschle is getting a pay raise....while at the same time trying to "postpone" my tax cut, which would be, in effect, a pay raise!!! He can have it, and we can't?

Pay the parasitical elite more money to write more destructive laws?!

Good grief. That is the definition and "poster child" for throwing good money after bad money.

Half the population breaks the law at least once a week. Businesses break the law almost daily. As Fredrick Bastiat would probably say, "society is not running head-first into destruction with all this lawlessness. In fact, if all the lawlessness people were apprehended (which is an impossibility) society would come to a screeching halt.

What a colossal waste of money all these laws are, and they want to add more laws and LEOs. Read it and weep...

"The U.S. Code, which contains all federal statutes, occupies 56,009 single-spaced pages. Its 47 volumes take up nine feet of shelf space. An annotated version, which attempts to bring order out of chaos, is three feet long and has 230 hardcover volumes and 36 paperback supplements. Administrative lawmaking under statutes fill up the 207-volume Code of Federal Regulations, which spans 21 feet of shelf space and contains more than 134,488 pages of regulatory law. … Federal law is further augmented by more than 2,756 volumes of judicial precedent, taking up 160 yards of law library shelving."
And you’re certain you’re not breaking one of those laws?
During the Clinton years alone, as James Bovard noted in Feeling Your Pain, "Federal agencies issued more than 25,000 new regulations—criminalizing everything from reliable toilets to snuff advertisements on race cars." And Bovard wrote that before Clinton’s final year in office, when the federal government issued more than 100,000 pages of new regulations. ***[I don't have the source from this quote that I pulled from Free Republic but I sure would appreciate it if someone could provide it.]

Fredrick Bastiat...

"If the natural tendencies of mankind are so bad that it is not safe to permit people to be free, how is it that the tendencies of these organizers are always good? Do not the legislators and their appointed agents also belong to the human race? Or do they believe that they themselves are made of a finer clay than the rest of mankind? The organizers maintain that society, when left undirected, rushes headlong to its inevitable destruction because the instincts of the people are so perverse. The legislators claim to stop this suicidal course and to give it a saner direction. Apparently, then, the legislators and the organizers have received from Heaven an intelligence and virtue that place them beyond and above mankind.
They would be the shepherds over us, their sheep. Certainly such an arrangement presupposes that they are naturally superior to the rest of us. And certainly we are fully justified in demanding from the legislators and organizers proof of this natural superiority." -- Frederick Bastiat, The Law (1850)

Parasitical elite, that's what they are.

We are being used. And used up.

Wake up! We don't need them. They need us. We are the host. They are the parasites.

Value Destroyers versus Value Producers

If civilization had to chose between business/science and government/bureaucracy, eliminating the other, which is the better choice?

The first thing civilization must have is business/science. It's what the family needs so that its members can live creative, productive, happy lives. Business/science can survive, even thrive without government/bureaucracy.
Government/bureaucracy cannot survive without business/science. In general, business/science and family is the host and government/bureaucracy is a parasite.
Aside from that, keep valid government services that protect individual rights and property. Military defense, FBI, CIA, police and courts. With the rest of government striped away those few valid services would be several fold more efficient and effective than they are today.

In truth this payraise and all other congressional payraises for the past 103 years have been taken on the backs of retired/disabled veterans, who have to pay back dollar for dollar from their pensions for the disability payments given to them for their wounds, injuries and sickness suffered while on active duty in the armed services.

Using the excuse of double dipping (which it isn't) Congress (the House and Senate) continues to gobble up the hard earned money of 20 year military retirees who aren't able to earn a decent living because of disabilities sustained keeping America free.

Retiree pensions are earned for 20 years or more of active duty, disability compensation is a payment from a grateful nation to the vets who sacrificed themselves ( their health and bodies) to defend the nation.

It is nothing but criminal what these bozos in Washington have done to retired/disabled vets. Every other employee of the federal government is allowed to receive concurrent receipt.

This year (2002 Defense Bill) Concurrent Receipt is included. The catch is that they (the bozos) conveniently forgot to fund it. My guess is that they think they can passify their Military Retiree/Disabled constituents by pointing to what they've done for them. Crying, "look, look what we've done for you.

Active duty military are going to receive a 5-10% base pay increase starting 1 January 2002, they deserve it and more. However, the disabled/retired veteran still gets the shaft from Uncle Sam. Shameful!!!!!!

Contact your Congressman and Senators and urge them to fully fund Concurrent Receipt for Retired/Disabled Veterans.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.