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I think there should be less money in politics, not more. Politics shouldn't be a lifelong career. Get in, do your duty, get out.

by LocalH 6y ago

ravi-delia 6y ago
That's a fantastic recipe for a rotating door of people with disposable income that benefit from political office. The only way to get less money in politics is to pay politicians more, and ban getting money elsewhere.
- timthorn 6y ago
  I'm of the opinion that MPs with a continuing outside job are incredibly valuable. The obvious example are the many MP doctors (who need to keep their skills current if they are to maintain registration) but wherever they work, having an active link with the "real world" brings another dimension to their policy decisions.
  - SOLAR_FIELDS 6y ago
    We have a system supposedly designed to do such a thing in Texas - the state legislature only meets for a few weeks every two years. The outcome is that no lower class job allows people to disappear for 8 weeks at a time, so essentially only rich people can participate in the system.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - ravi-delia 6y ago
    That's definitely worth thinking about, but I just don't know if it outweighs having high quality applicants that really know what they're doing in office. Politics is (or at least should be) a difficult specialist position.
- cmmeur01 6y ago
  Sounds like publicly funded elections, not paying the individuals more.
- Gibbon1 6y ago
  My dad worked as an engineer for the Feds for 30 years. Eventually promoted to a GS14. I've listened to people bitch about public servants. But seriously it's job. Above a certain level everything is partly political. Government doesn't do anything without an overriding need/patron. Effective politicians have to be able to balance competing interests, hire and lead teams with extensive domain knowledge about how various government agencies work. Understand the law. Goes on and on. It's kinda deranged that a google bro gets paid more for vastly less important work.
Analemma_ 6y ago
No; that incentivizes people to unsustainably grab as much as they can for themselves and their base during the brief time they’re in office, without concern for what happens afterward. ”Après moi, le déluge”
hayst4ck 6y ago
My limited understanding of Chinese politics (who we should be comparing to as America's primary competition in the world) is that leaders must spend time getting experience at lower levels of government in order to be in high levels of government. This means that politicians theortically have experience. Certainly at face value and in good faith, this seems like a good idea. It seems like a very sane position to want your governors to have run a city, and your presidents to have run a state. It seems like you would want your admiral's to have run a ship. It seems like you would want your CTO's to have run a technical team. Why do you think politics is the one area where experience is not beneficial to doing the job well? I understand upper age limits, but I don't understand term limits at all.
hayst4ck 6y ago
> I think there should be less money in politics Using a thought experiment, I must ask the question: Let's say we paid politicians $0? What kind of person would you expect to be a politician? Let's say we paid politicians $5 million/year. What kind of person would you expect to be a politician?
- dudul 6y ago
  For a salary of $0, someone who's already uber successful, doesn't need the money and is into it for the challenge. $5M someone who just wants to make a boat load of money. Is a parameter missing from your thought experiment? Are you thinking of corruption?
  - hayst4ck 6y ago
    > For a salary of $0, someone who's already uber successful, doesn't need the money and is into it for the challenge. Yeah, so who is not running? If it paid $0, that creates a definite class of people who cannot run. Furthermore I suspect that any income deficit would be gained by using the position's power for personal gain. If it paid $0, we probably wouldn't see AOC in office. Many politicians travel between DC and their home. If money is insufficient for that, it could create worse representation. These politicians employ assistants and advisors, lower salary theoretically creates poor incentives (corruption) or getting candidates that are less valuable (industry might be able to out compete). Just about everyone wants money, and $5M is a lot. It excludes virtually no one, and is enough money that you don't really need any other sources of income. $10mil is enough to live a middle class life without working for the rest of your life. I would expect that type of compensation to breed more fierce competition. I don't think it's in any way obvious that politicians should not be paid well, nor do I think it's at all obvious what the result of low or high compensations for politicians would be.

I think there should be less money in politics, not more. Politics shouldn't be a lifelong career. Get in, do your duty, get out.

by LocalH 6y ago

I think there should be less money in politics, not more. Politics shouldn't be a lifelong career. Get in, do your duty, get out.

ravi-delia 6y ago

That's a fantastic recipe for a rotating door of people with disposable income that benefit from political office. The only way to get less money in politics is to pay politicians more, and ban getting money elsewhere.

timthorn 6y ago
I'm of the opinion that MPs with a continuing outside job are incredibly valuable. The obvious example are the many MP doctors (who need to keep their skills current if they are to maintain registration) but wherever they work, having an active link with the "real world" brings another dimension to their policy decisions.
- SOLAR_FIELDS 6y ago
  We have a system supposedly designed to do such a thing in Texas - the state legislature only meets for a few weeks every two years. The outcome is that no lower class job allows people to disappear for 8 weeks at a time, so essentially only rich people can participate in the system.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- ravi-delia 6y ago
  That's definitely worth thinking about, but I just don't know if it outweighs having high quality applicants that really know what they're doing in office. Politics is (or at least should be) a difficult specialist position.
cmmeur01 6y ago
Sounds like publicly funded elections, not paying the individuals more.
Gibbon1 6y ago
My dad worked as an engineer for the Feds for 30 years. Eventually promoted to a GS14. I've listened to people bitch about public servants. But seriously it's job. Above a certain level everything is partly political. Government doesn't do anything without an overriding need/patron. Effective politicians have to be able to balance competing interests, hire and lead teams with extensive domain knowledge about how various government agencies work. Understand the law. Goes on and on. It's kinda deranged that a google bro gets paid more for vastly less important work.

Analemma_ 6y ago

No; that incentivizes people to unsustainably grab as much as they can for themselves and their base during the brief time they’re in office, without concern for what happens afterward. ”Après moi, le déluge”

hayst4ck 6y ago

My limited understanding of Chinese politics (who we should be comparing to as America's primary competition in the world) is that leaders must spend time getting experience at lower levels of government in order to be in high levels of government. This means that politicians theortically have experience. Certainly at face value and in good faith, this seems like a good idea. It seems like a very sane position to want your governors to have run a city, and your presidents to have run a state. It seems like you would want your admiral's to have run a ship. It seems like you would want your CTO's to have run a technical team. Why do you think politics is the one area where experience is not beneficial to doing the job well? I understand upper age limits, but I don't understand term limits at all.

hayst4ck 6y ago

> I think there should be less money in politics Using a thought experiment, I must ask the question: Let's say we paid politicians $0? What kind of person would you expect to be a politician? Let's say we paid politicians $5 million/year. What kind of person would you expect to be a politician?

dudul 6y ago
For a salary of $0, someone who's already uber successful, doesn't need the money and is into it for the challenge. $5M someone who just wants to make a boat load of money. Is a parameter missing from your thought experiment? Are you thinking of corruption?
- hayst4ck 6y ago
  > For a salary of $0, someone who's already uber successful, doesn't need the money and is into it for the challenge. Yeah, so who is not running? If it paid $0, that creates a definite class of people who cannot run. Furthermore I suspect that any income deficit would be gained by using the position's power for personal gain. If it paid $0, we probably wouldn't see AOC in office. Many politicians travel between DC and their home. If money is insufficient for that, it could create worse representation. These politicians employ assistants and advisors, lower salary theoretically creates poor incentives (corruption) or getting candidates that are less valuable (industry might be able to out compete). Just about everyone wants money, and $5M is a lot. It excludes virtually no one, and is enough money that you don't really need any other sources of income. $10mil is enough to live a middle class life without working for the rest of your life. I would expect that type of compensation to breed more fierce competition. I don't think it's in any way obvious that politicians should not be paid well, nor do I think it's at all obvious what the result of low or high compensations for politicians would be.