8 ms·

So should all politicians receive money exclusively from lobbyists/donors? Or I guess they should go get paycheck jobs somewhere? Where does a politicians mone

So should all politicians receive money exclusively from lobbyists/donors? Or I guess they should go get paycheck jobs somewhere? Where does a politicians money come from? If they exclusively received their money from stock trading as opposed to lobbyists/donors, how do you think the policy decisions would change?

danaris 4y ago
....They get a salary? It's not huge, by rich-people standards (which is a legitimate concern, as it does lead to very rich people being more able to take politician jobs than regular people), but, what, you thought they relied on graft to buy their dinners??
- willcipriano 4y ago
  It is huge by the people they are supposed to govern standards though. It would be a raise to virtually everyone except the top 1% of people in terms of household income. They also receive top of line medical care and retirement benefits in addition to the salary. The salary isn't preventing poor people from becoming elected officials.
  - tootallgavin 4y ago
    > The salary isn't preventing poor people from becoming elected officials. I agree, and trading stocks is not keeping poor people from becoming elected officials either
  - danaris 4y ago
    It would be much more effective to guarantee that the salary of Congresspeople was a fixed multiple of the minimum wage than to attempt to force Congresspeople to live on minimum wage (or anything similar). Even as it stands, just relying on their Congressional salary, it can be difficult for Congresspeople to maintain a residence in their district and one in DC—which is a fairly expensive real estate market—which is effectively a requirement of their position. Within some fairly clear limits, increasing the salary paid to those in Congress would have a tendency to decrease their reliance on lobbying money, rather than increase their appetite for it.
    - willcipriano 4y ago
      Studio apartments in DC are available for $2000 - $2300 a month, that's $27,600 a year, leaving them with $146,000 a year to secure a place to live within their home state, or roughly triple the median household income. For most Americans that would be a massive increase in their standard of living. Rather than paying our politicians more to hopefully prevent them from being corrupt I'd suggest putting them in prison anytime we catch even a slight whiff of impropriety.
- tootallgavin 4y ago
  > but, what, you thought they relied on graft to buy their dinners They will if this ban is instituted
ziddoap 4y ago
>So should all politicians receive money exclusively from lobbyists/donors? Or I guess they should go get paycheck jobs somewhere? Am I mistaken? I thought most political position are paid positions. Currently north of $150,000 USD for members of congress, I think?
- tootallgavin 4y ago
  And so how do these members of congress pay for staffing, research, etc? with just 150K per year?
  - ziddoap 4y ago
    Through your taxpaying dollars, just like every other government worker? >pay for [...] research Thanks for the laugh. They might read research, but they aren't personally funding it. You may wish to read up on the subject of government work, salaries, etc. before you go debating about it on the net. Most of this stuff is covered in early Civics classes, and as someone who presumably pays taxes, you might be interested in finding out where and how those dollars get distributed!
    - tootallgavin 4y ago
      > They might read research, but they aren't personally funding it. might read, or have someone else tell them the important bits. This cost money either way > Through your taxpaying dollars, just like every other government worker? If this were the case, why are the politicians even trading stocks to begin with? if they wanted money why not be a private individual and then there would be no scrutiny on trading stocks.
  - paulcole 4y ago
    It’s called the Members’ Representational Allowance and is north of $1,000,000 per year. https://sgp.fas.org/crs/misc/RL30064.pdf https://sgp.fas.org/crs/misc/RL30064.pdf
    - 4y ago
wbsss4412 4y ago
Politicians don’t receive money directly from lobbyists and donors. Doing so would be a violation of rules against taking bribes. Lobbyists and donors give money to campaigns, which require untold sums of money these days, and a congresspersons power within the party is directly correlated to their ability to fundraise for the party. As to their actual personal means of a congresspersons wealth, they’re paid fairly high salaries (close to 200k per year, which, despite the expectations of this forum is quite a bit for the US) and yes, they have the ability to engage in their own investments and business dealings on the side. Not to mention their incredibly generous pensions.
- tootallgavin 4y ago
  > Politicians don’t receive money directly from lobbyists and donors. Doing so would be a violation of rules against taking bribes. > a congresspersons power within the party is directly correlated to their ability to fundraise for the party I agree, trading stocks is an easy, relatively passive way of doing this.
  - wbsss4412 4y ago
    I’m not sure what connection you’re drawing here. The main issue at hand is related to the fact that congresspeople are able to trade stocks on the basis of the insider information they have about upcoming legislation/changes to government policy.
    - tootallgavin 4y ago
      I know. There always going to people smarter than me in more privileged positions than me. It would be weird if said people acted in a way that would incapacitate themselves. (Here, I am referring to the congresspeople) There are laws in place that govern congresspeople's trades. These are ignored. They should be enforced. If congresspeople (or who?) are ignoring/not-enforcing the previous laws, what are they going to do with these new ones?
epgui 4y ago
> Where does a politicians money come from? They have an annual salary.
- tootallgavin 4y ago
  What about the salaries of the staff? What about the tools needed to perform the job?
  - evan_ 4y ago
    They get a budget. They're not schoolteachers.
    - tootallgavin 4y ago
      > They get a budget. What happens when they exceed the budget?
      - evan_ 4y ago
        Either checks bounce, or some other office covers the shortage and the account is just overdrawn until paid back. There was a minor scandal about this in 1992. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_banking_scandal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_banking_scandal
ch4s3 4y ago
Senators make $174,000/yr and most are already wealthy before running for election.No one is asking them to give up all income streams outside of their jobs, just to stop trading individual stocks. Senators have a LOT of knowledge about things that will effect stock prices that is outside of the public realm. Trading on that knowledge is a clear violation of public trust.
- tootallgavin 4y ago
  > just to stop trading individual stocks Why? Is buying a particular car not an investment? what about a house? Buying and selling assets should not be criminalized. Having privileged knowledge is part of the game. Someone who cannot read and write is going to have a tough time in life. Insider trading is already illegal. Also, investing in a publicly traded company is a weird way of violating public trust. Its as if the public does not know it too can invest where their politicians have invested.
  - ericmay 4y ago
    > Why? So keeping in mind this doesn't preclude lawmakers from investing or buying index funds or ETFs, but the reason is because they literally create legislation that benefits certain companies. CHIPS Act is a recent example. So they can do something like buy stock in a company, and then advocate for a law to pass that benefits that company, and then make money by doing that. What we want to do is separate "what's good for me" from "what's good for the country" and remove conflicts of interest like that. There's no real reason for a lawmaker or their immediate family to be buying individual stocks. Instead it makes more sense for them to invest in something like a market index so that if there are incentives to be aligned they should be focused on benefiting the entire market instead of any specific companies.
    - tootallgavin 4y ago
      > There's no real reason for a lawmaker or their immediate family to be buying individual stocks. You lost me here. Participating in society is okay. Maybe in the case of a judge, who is supposed to be impartial, this could be the case. But an insulated lawmaker is definitely not the way to go. If a lawmaker riuns his financial status via the stockmarket, cool! Elect someone else. > So they can do something like buy stock in a company, and then advocate for a law to pass that benefits that company, and then make money by doing that. They could do same thing with real estate or vehicles or guns or anything else. Imagine a politician attempting to pass a law banning guns but just before it passes that politician buys a bunch of guns. Or, in 1930s, when an order was given that made it a criminal offense for U.S. citizens to own or trade gold anywhere in the world. > What we want to do is separate "what's good for me" from "what's good for the country" and remove conflicts of interest like that. Which politicians are interested in "what's good for the country" over "what's good for me"? And why is that why anyone is elected? I though we voted on issues, ideologies, directions-to-go-in and policy etc. Every politician gets elected because what they'll do is "what's good for the country". And then we elect the next politician

danaris 4y ago

....They get a salary? It's not huge, by rich-people standards (which is a legitimate concern, as it does lead to very rich people being more able to take politician jobs than regular people), but, what, you thought they relied on graft to buy their dinners??

willcipriano 4y ago
It is huge by the people they are supposed to govern standards though. It would be a raise to virtually everyone except the top 1% of people in terms of household income. They also receive top of line medical care and retirement benefits in addition to the salary. The salary isn't preventing poor people from becoming elected officials.
- tootallgavin 4y ago
  > The salary isn't preventing poor people from becoming elected officials. I agree, and trading stocks is not keeping poor people from becoming elected officials either
- danaris 4y ago
  It would be much more effective to guarantee that the salary of Congresspeople was a fixed multiple of the minimum wage than to attempt to force Congresspeople to live on minimum wage (or anything similar). Even as it stands, just relying on their Congressional salary, it can be difficult for Congresspeople to maintain a residence in their district and one in DC—which is a fairly expensive real estate market—which is effectively a requirement of their position. Within some fairly clear limits, increasing the salary paid to those in Congress would have a tendency to decrease their reliance on lobbying money, rather than increase their appetite for it.
  - willcipriano 4y ago
    Studio apartments in DC are available for $2000 - $2300 a month, that's $27,600 a year, leaving them with $146,000 a year to secure a place to live within their home state, or roughly triple the median household income. For most Americans that would be a massive increase in their standard of living. Rather than paying our politicians more to hopefully prevent them from being corrupt I'd suggest putting them in prison anytime we catch even a slight whiff of impropriety.
tootallgavin 4y ago
> but, what, you thought they relied on graft to buy their dinners They will if this ban is instituted

ziddoap 4y ago

>So should all politicians receive money exclusively from lobbyists/donors? Or I guess they should go get paycheck jobs somewhere? Am I mistaken? I thought most political position are paid positions. Currently north of $150,000 USD for members of congress, I think?

tootallgavin 4y ago
And so how do these members of congress pay for staffing, research, etc? with just 150K per year?
- ziddoap 4y ago
  Through your taxpaying dollars, just like every other government worker? >pay for [...] research Thanks for the laugh. They might read research, but they aren't personally funding it. You may wish to read up on the subject of government work, salaries, etc. before you go debating about it on the net. Most of this stuff is covered in early Civics classes, and as someone who presumably pays taxes, you might be interested in finding out where and how those dollars get distributed!
  - tootallgavin 4y ago
    > They might read research, but they aren't personally funding it. might read, or have someone else tell them the important bits. This cost money either way > Through your taxpaying dollars, just like every other government worker? If this were the case, why are the politicians even trading stocks to begin with? if they wanted money why not be a private individual and then there would be no scrutiny on trading stocks.
- paulcole 4y ago
  It’s called the Members’ Representational Allowance and is north of $1,000,000 per year. https://sgp.fas.org/crs/misc/RL30064.pdf https://sgp.fas.org/crs/misc/RL30064.pdf
  - 4y ago

wbsss4412 4y ago

Politicians don’t receive money directly from lobbyists and donors. Doing so would be a violation of rules against taking bribes. Lobbyists and donors give money to campaigns, which require untold sums of money these days, and a congresspersons power within the party is directly correlated to their ability to fundraise for the party. As to their actual personal means of a congresspersons wealth, they’re paid fairly high salaries (close to 200k per year, which, despite the expectations of this forum is quite a bit for the US) and yes, they have the ability to engage in their own investments and business dealings on the side. Not to mention their incredibly generous pensions.

tootallgavin 4y ago
> Politicians don’t receive money directly from lobbyists and donors. Doing so would be a violation of rules against taking bribes. > a congresspersons power within the party is directly correlated to their ability to fundraise for the party I agree, trading stocks is an easy, relatively passive way of doing this.
- wbsss4412 4y ago
  I’m not sure what connection you’re drawing here. The main issue at hand is related to the fact that congresspeople are able to trade stocks on the basis of the insider information they have about upcoming legislation/changes to government policy.
  - tootallgavin 4y ago
    I know. There always going to people smarter than me in more privileged positions than me. It would be weird if said people acted in a way that would incapacitate themselves. (Here, I am referring to the congresspeople) There are laws in place that govern congresspeople's trades. These are ignored. They should be enforced. If congresspeople (or who?) are ignoring/not-enforcing the previous laws, what are they going to do with these new ones?

epgui 4y ago

> Where does a politicians money come from? They have an annual salary.

tootallgavin 4y ago
What about the salaries of the staff? What about the tools needed to perform the job?
- evan_ 4y ago
  They get a budget. They're not schoolteachers.
  - tootallgavin 4y ago
    > They get a budget. What happens when they exceed the budget?
    - evan_ 4y ago
      Either checks bounce, or some other office covers the shortage and the account is just overdrawn until paid back. There was a minor scandal about this in 1992. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_banking_scandal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_banking_scandal

ch4s3 4y ago

Senators make $174,000/yr and most are already wealthy before running for election.No one is asking them to give up all income streams outside of their jobs, just to stop trading individual stocks. Senators have a LOT of knowledge about things that will effect stock prices that is outside of the public realm. Trading on that knowledge is a clear violation of public trust.

tootallgavin 4y ago
> just to stop trading individual stocks Why? Is buying a particular car not an investment? what about a house? Buying and selling assets should not be criminalized. Having privileged knowledge is part of the game. Someone who cannot read and write is going to have a tough time in life. Insider trading is already illegal. Also, investing in a publicly traded company is a weird way of violating public trust. Its as if the public does not know it too can invest where their politicians have invested.
- ericmay 4y ago
  > Why? So keeping in mind this doesn't preclude lawmakers from investing or buying index funds or ETFs, but the reason is because they literally create legislation that benefits certain companies. CHIPS Act is a recent example. So they can do something like buy stock in a company, and then advocate for a law to pass that benefits that company, and then make money by doing that. What we want to do is separate "what's good for me" from "what's good for the country" and remove conflicts of interest like that. There's no real reason for a lawmaker or their immediate family to be buying individual stocks. Instead it makes more sense for them to invest in something like a market index so that if there are incentives to be aligned they should be focused on benefiting the entire market instead of any specific companies.
  - tootallgavin 4y ago
    > There's no real reason for a lawmaker or their immediate family to be buying individual stocks. You lost me here. Participating in society is okay. Maybe in the case of a judge, who is supposed to be impartial, this could be the case. But an insulated lawmaker is definitely not the way to go. If a lawmaker riuns his financial status via the stockmarket, cool! Elect someone else. > So they can do something like buy stock in a company, and then advocate for a law to pass that benefits that company, and then make money by doing that. They could do same thing with real estate or vehicles or guns or anything else. Imagine a politician attempting to pass a law banning guns but just before it passes that politician buys a bunch of guns. Or, in 1930s, when an order was given that made it a criminal offense for U.S. citizens to own or trade gold anywhere in the world. > What we want to do is separate "what's good for me" from "what's good for the country" and remove conflicts of interest like that. Which politicians are interested in "what's good for the country" over "what's good for me"? And why is that why anyone is elected? I though we voted on issues, ideologies, directions-to-go-in and policy etc. Every politician gets elected because what they'll do is "what's good for the country". And then we elect the next politician