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The relatively low salaries compared to the huge amounts of power is almost begging for insider trading, influence peddling, etc. > The salary of a Congress me
by awb 5y ago
The relatively low salaries compared to the huge amounts of power is almost begging for insider trading, influence peddling, etc.
> The salary of a Congress member varies based on the job title of the congressman or senator. Most senators, representatives, delegates and the resident commissioner from Puerto Rico make a salary of $174,000 per year.
https://www.indeed.com/career-advice/pay-salary/congressman-salary https://www.indeed.com/career-advice/pay-salary/congressman-...
Then again, some people have near insatiable greed and even at a $1M/year salary, some would be looking for ways to further boost their income at the boundaries of ethics, or beyond.
- fdgsdfogijq 5y agoNot really, most people very high up in the FED are already independently wealthy
- toomuchtodo 5y agoYour last sentence is really the key thesis. This isn't an argument to pay representatives (whether that be Congressional or at monetary policy orgs) more, but to have robust controls to better detect and action corruption. Greed knows no bounds (see: corrupt billionaires and Dark Triad personality traits [1]) and humans will be humans, so strong systems must be designed and implemented to defend against improper behavior. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_triad https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_triad
- onlyrealcuzzo 5y agoAlternatively - maybe it's not so great that government is so big and central and has so much power. Politicians are gonna find ways to corrupt that power no matter what. The same could be said for megacorps. Unfortunately, we don't live in an ideal world. China and Chinese SOEs are going to be big and powerful and centralized for the foreseeable future no matter what - and if we don't have anything to oppose them - that doesn't seem great either.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- pphysch 5y agoDeliberately getting rid of "big government" just leads to even more unaccountable megacorps filling the void. That's been the lesson of America for the past 40-50 years. If you want any chance of competing on the global stage in the 3rd millennium, the solution is to embrace big government and do it right. It is possible to implement anti-corruption mechanisms. Like any security measure, they will never be infallible, but they will certainly increase the friction required to be corrupt. Otherwise, your country will be a sickly host to parasitic & transnational megacorps. Like America and many smaller countries today.
- jokethrowaway 5y agoPrivate businesses are the only thing that kept America relevant. If it wasn't for Big Tech, the USA would be poorer and much less relevant. The centralised American army, with its huge spend, doesn't have much to show for. I dislike megacorps as well: I would prefer to have smaller businesses so that the power would be more spread across society. Incidentally the government and their regulations are often what helps monopolies to solidify and become unbeatable. Maybe if you get rid of all government and not only of "big government" you will have less corruption and mega corporations as well.
- fennecfoxen 5y agoMeh. It’s a lot easier to hold big mega corps to account with small government than it is to hold big government to account by any means whatsoever. Besides, in practice big government rather prefers doing business with a few big companies and national labor unions who will pay for the politicians’ campaigns and talk up their agenda — applying discretionary enforcement to hobble enemies, and big-time regulation can be a major barrier to entry that reduces competition for your friends. Perhaps you don’t believe me? For a trivial example in recent memory about how government is happy to oppress its enemies by “holding them to account”, consider Operation Chokepoint. It’s a valid concern, mind you! I’m just skeptical of the remedy. You need a hell of a lot of faith in the policies of the next several decades to think this is a good idea. I don’t.
- lumost 5y agoLiving in DC on 174k/yr with a family and a spouse whose job prospects are limited by your profession is a tough order. You are effectively demanding that policy makers be self sufficient, which selects for those policy makers most likely to benefit financially from policy decisions.
- dahfizz 5y agoTo claim living on an income of $174k is a tough order is the most HN thing I've heard in a while. That's an absolute ton of money. You can live comfortably (but not luxuriously) anywhere on earth with that salary.
- jdavis703 5y agoUnfortunately, Congress people must live in the districts they represent. And while $174k is quite decent even in SF, this person will have a standard of living below even what a software engineer with no management responsibilities is going to have.
- batch12 5y agoMaybe they would be able to better empathize with the vast majority of people they represent.
- jdavis703 5y agoWhy would an ambitious person run for office if the pay is low? We’ve already tried this experiment with government industries like teaching, and then we wonder why American educational policy is loosing global competitiveness.
- dragonwriter 5y ago> Why would an ambitious person run for office if the pay is low? Power. Exposure. Experience and connections that are useful in highly-paid lobbying and other political influence positions. Serving their own direct, or others who will be thankful, financial interests in ways that will generate orders of magnitude more returns than the direct pay of the position. Etc.
- smolder 5y agoThis is about the Fed banning it's own policymakers from owning them, not about congress.
- smnrchrds 5y agoChair of the Federal Reserve has a salary of US$221,400.
- animal_spirits 5y agoCorrect, the article has zero mentions of congress
- Roboprog 5y agoPerhaps someone will start a “Speaker of the House” index fund which the officers from the Federal Reserve can buy, since they won’t be able to buy individual stocks.
- glial 5y agoFolks are doing it manually: https://www.npr.org/2021/09/21/1039313011/tiktokers-are-trading-stocks-by-watching-what-members-of-congress-do https://www.npr.org/2021/09/21/1039313011/tiktokers-are-trad...
- tlear 5y agoThis is good “The Speaker has no prior knowledge or subsequent involvement in any transactions," said the spokesperson.
- tessierashpool 5y agothank you for this extremely important correction. I was reading the comments instead of the article and wondering in the back of my mind how the Fed even had jurisdiction over Congress. sure hope it remains visible in the comment hierarchy.
- 5y ago
- Factorium 5y agoThis is the case all over the Western world. Federal Government politician salaries need to be 10x higher.
- trident5000 5y ago10x higher in combination with term limits. This would actually be a great incentive for them to actually vote for it.
- officeplant 5y agoSometimes I feel like congress and representatives should make the minimum wage of the area they represent. Might encourage them to actually improve things for the people.
- kesselvon 5y agoIt's a good way to only get the rich to become federal politicians. Congress gets paid like 174k a year. Sure, it's a lot of money compared to the US median, but anyone who can get elected to Congress can earn that elsewhere. For tech, 174k isn't even a big salary; we're talking an industry where a starting SE salary at a FAANG is around there. That's not a huge paycheck for a 24/7 job like federal politics.
- dragonwriter 5y ago> Might encourage them to actually improve things for the people. The history of unpaid and low-paid legislatures (of which there is quite a lot) does not really support this idea.
- alexashka 5y ago170k is already a functional equivalent of the minimum wage, relative to the power they yield. You're describing what we already have. The argument being made is that if you're going to pay people a low wage, they'll just increase it by trading some of the power they yield in exchange for money for themselves, which is the problem we're trying to solve for :)
- 5y ago
- FormerBandmate 5y agoHonestly, we should give the Federal Reserve performance-based pay. Elon Musk has literally been paid billions for Tesla's phenomenal stock outperformance, why shouldn't we pay the Fed Chairs tens of millions for sustained real GDP growth above 4% balanced with low wealth inequality, low inflation, and low unemployment? They have the most important job in America and they should be paid like it if they do well
- errantmind 5y agoThis breaks down when multi-term policy decisions need to be made. This would only push them to kick the can down the road
- srcreigh 5y agoWhat if they are paid based on performance in 10 years, after they are out?
- handmodel 5y agoWould certainly be better but I would say ten years is not a crazy long time when it comes to borrowing decisions that often have 30 years timetables. Also doesn't capture in the the unequalness of gains. Which is better - the fed doing something that has 90% chance of huge gains or a 10% chance of catastrophic economy shattering loss? Or an 80% chance of huge gains and a 20% chance of gains netting 0? The first is much more desirable if maximizing a bonus and could be tempting - but I dont think we want that risk.
- spaetzleesser 5y agoIt’s the same problem as CEO pay. But measuring success is even harder.
- FormerBandmate 5y agoYeah, this is about what I’m thinking. Normal salaries but options for massive payouts if things do well
- 5y ago
- davesque 5y agoYeah, the other day this really hit home for me. I don't know why I hadn't previously thought about it in such clear terms. Being a congressperson has to be one of the most morally hazardous occupations in the world. I mean, you have more direct control over how our entire society works than almost anyone else. So you become the perfect target for bribery and gain access to countless levers that you could pull in your own favor or the favor of your friends. I suppose this all goes without saying but for some reason it only recently dawned on me just how much this is true. And the position must select for people who are the most willing to exploit all those opportunities. Not sure how to really solve for it. Maybe getting paid more would help but I don't know.
- tshaddox 5y agoHow about just actually making the bad stuff illegal and actually investigating and prosecuting it? Note that we’re discussing known bad things that congresspeople are doing.
- tessierashpool 5y agoin many, many cases the bad stuff is already illegal, and it's the investigations and prosecutions that are missing.
- louloulou 5y agoWelcome to the libertarian/small government world view!
- josho 5y agoWow, so that actually deters me from libertarian ideals. It sounds like your logic is something like the following: Government is corruptible, so we should have small/weak governments. But, a small gov. doesn't solve the root problem, it just make it easier to corrupt what little power is left. Isn't the real solution to have some group responsible for providing oversight and enforcement to elected officials?
- 99_00 5y agoIf Jerome Powell was greedy he would simply get a job in the private sector. Anyone who is capable of getting the job as Fed Chairman will have no problem making a lot, easily and legally. Believe it or not, some people go into public service with the desire to serve the public. Sometimes there are people who have already achieved tremendous financial success.
- FpUser 5y ago>"Believe it or not, some people go into public service with the desire to serve the public." If under "public" you mean riches who buy those "public servants" in bulk using legalized bribes and cushy corporate jobs after terms then I would agree. I am sure there are few good exceptions but they do not paint the whole picture.
- giaour 5y agoI wonder is this is intentionally set to match the top level of the GS (civil service) pay scale in the DC area.
- WaitWaitWha 5y agojust to expand, indeed their salaries are relative average. But, their benefits package both during and after tenure is generous. Their package include health & life insurance outside the general public market, social security, FERS, CSRS, personnel & office and mail allowances, office space, furniture, office equipment, food, laundry, and much more. It will definitely not make them millionaires, but will allow them to live an upper echelon life; compared to some of us, even luxurious life.
- aspenmayer 5y agoDon't forget that all Congress members and former members get a fully vested pension after only 5 years in Congress, which can be collected at age 62, or even lower ages for longer time served. However, the Fed is distinct from Congress. Not sure if the Fed also participates in FERS. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congressional_pension https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congressional_pension https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Employees_Retirement_System https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Employees_Retirement_S...
- dragonwriter 5y ago> Don’t forget that all Congress members and former members get a fully vested pension after only 5 years in Congress Fully vested, but at 1.0% of the top 3 years salary per year of service. So, sure, at 5 years of service @ 174K per year, they could draw pension at 62 – but that pension would only be $8,700/year.
- fragmede 5y agoListen, I know we're all senior developers working at a FAANG, making between $300k-500k/year in total compensation, but $160k/yr is a giant pile of money for many, many Americans. The fact that it's $160k + health insurance plan that qualifies as "really fucking good" makes that $160k far more than the already-above-average Joe's 160k.
- xboxnolifes 5y agoI didn't realize GP was using that number too make it sound low. At first I thought the 175k number was an attempt to show how much better paid that position is compared to the rest. The fact that the average position in the source is just under 200k/year and people are reading it as a bad package seems incredibly out of touch.
- missedthecue 5y agoCEOs make $20 million a year and have done crimes like insider trading. Lots of congresspeople are already independently wealthy. I don't think a pay raise would impact it at all
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- 01100011 5y agoI feel the same thing can apply to cops too. I'm all for paying people in these positions market rate or even slightly above. That has to be coupled with effective oversight and higher penalties which are actually enforced. We need to stop treating white collar crime lighter than blue collar crime.
- ootsootsoots 5y ago[dead]
- CountDrewku 5y agoThis doesn't apply to Congress >The ban includes top policymakers such as those who sit on the Federal Open Market Committee, along with senior staff.
- whiddershins 5y agoI hold the unpopular opinion we should pay elected officials waaaaaay more. Like 1B/year for President or something. Some amount that would attract the best, and make being corrupt seem so very counterproductive.
- amelius 5y agoOr how about we allow only Nobel prize winners to be president? If they're bad at being a president, then at least they contributed to society.
- WalterBright 5y agoSome? How many people would compromise their ethics a bit for $1,000,000? how about $10,000,000? $100,000,000? Most everybody. It's easy to be virtuous when there's no temptation.
- wolverine876 5y ago> Most everybody. It depends what you mean, but I think you underestimate people. We all contain virtue and greed, and have the free will to choose which we will favor. Of course, it's more complicated than that anyway: What happens is that some kinds of corruption become normalized and thus people don't feel they are violating ethics, and some corruption, though objectively no worse, is not normalized and is responded to with outrage.
- WalterBright 5y agoI agree that a culture of non-corruption needs to be created, and that culture flows down from the top. Caltech did a good job of that with the Honor System. The Tour de France did a miserable job, as competitors feel they have to cheat in order to have a chance. It's still not a good idea to tempt people too much, and any system should be set up to not be too tempting.
- wolverine876 5y ago'Locks keep honest people honest.'
- kolbe 5y agoAlso think about the thing they’re doing to compromise their ethics: they’re buying stocks with an ‘unfair’ advantage. This isn’t exactly sending kids to war for kickbacks.
- pessimizer 5y agoThis is an example of the "you can pay people not to be corrupt" argument. It relies on people who are both willing to be corrupt, and happy to leave money on the table. It's exactly the same argument as paying for media not to include advertisements. What we should do is stop filtering for trash by having jobs that pay $174K require multi-million dollar application fees (i.e. a campaign.) That's exactly how you would hire for a job if you wanted to make sure that the primary purpose of having that job was personal enrichment. We talk about being saddled with college debt; we can see the results of being saddled with campaign debt. How does that happen when your government is run by two tiny private clubs fueled by exactly that sort of personal ambition? It doesn't. Getting a handle on corruption in the US is going to take a lot more than a few tiny adjustments. Especially when the people responsible for making those adjustments would be the corrupt class we would be claiming to fix. Expecting Congress to fix itself when Congress is composed of the people who were good at this process is bizarre. The best a centrist can do is wait for the courts to fix it. edit: The court broke it more with Citizens United. It simply doesn't believe that self-enrichment from politics is bad in and of itself. It believes that part of democracy is that the elected person has a mandate to do what they think is best, within the rule of law, and helpfully abolishes any laws or norms that would prevent bribery. https://www.newyorker.com/news/amy-davidson/the-supreme-courts-bribery-blessing-mcdonnell-decision https://www.newyorker.com/news/amy-davidson/the-supreme-cour...
- buu700 5y agoWhat if we substantially raised salaries — let's say to $100m/yr for the president, and lower but proportional amounts for all other major officials at the federal level — while on the other hand treating corruption-related crimes for those officials as tantamount to light treason? (Just a thought experiment, not something I'm seriously proposing.)
- _3u10 5y agoMore income means more leverage.
- gremIin 5y ago> The best a centrist can do is wait for the courts to fix it. That is not how corruption is fixed.
- zz865 5y agoIts the other way around - it encourages wealthy people to serve as a public service.
- plandis 5y agoThe Federal Reserve doesn’t have the power to regulate members of congress AFAIK. This is specifically them regulating people that work for the Federal Reserve
- poulsbohemian 5y agoI'd rather see Congressional salaries indexed to household incomes. While sure, $174K might be nominal in the private professional world, it's still 3x average US household income. They have health insurance and pensions. Better gig than the vast majority of their voting constituents. It might give them some humility and understanding of the plight of those constituents if they were remunerated similarly.
- chillacy 5y agoIf one believes that legislators should be drawn from a pool of competent individuals who have options in private industry, you'd look at executive salaries in industry instead of the average US household. Singapore indexes its government pay to that of the private industry for this reason, but they're also ruthlessly meritocratic and some might say, elitist. Yet also very effective. The two seem related to me, but it might not mesh well with American values.
- andreareina 5y agoLiving in Singapore, I know a number of people who would have trouble with that statement.
- macintux 5y agoRemember that $174K is typically spread between two households, and cost of living in DC is definitely not low.
- poulsbohemian 5y agoWell, there's a solution for the housing thing too: dormitories or a flat housing allowance. These folks are intended to maintain a life in their constituencies, therefore their homes in WA DC should be treated as transient. Thus, a housing allowance similar to what other Federal employees encounter, and/or a Congressional dormitory, to me sounds like a perfectly acceptable solution. This is a job intended to be for the good of the American people, not a stepping stone to further wealth as it's been treated.