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If you underpay elected officials then 1. they just start taking bribes 2. only rich people will run in the election. This is why Singapore pays them even more
by astrange 3y ago
If you underpay elected officials then 1. they just start taking bribes 2. only rich people will run in the election.
This is why Singapore pays them even more than we do.
Anyway, minimum wages (despite being ok policies) aren't what people are actually paid, and of course aren't especially what non-working people are paid. And remember that non-working people, namely children and the elderly, are poorer than workers.
- hinkley 3y agoTHEY ALREADY DO Nobody said the multiple has to be 5. It could be whatever the current ratio for Singapore is.
- lnxg33k1 3y agoI am always suprised at how people think that elected official then have to get bribes in order to survive like its a doctor prescription, and how it seems that when they do we can’t do anything about it ffs
- Alupis 3y agoJust look at most countries around the world. Corrupt elected officials is more of the norm, than the anomaly world-wide.
- astrange 3y agoThey mostly don't, people just like being cynical. Though, legislators don't have individual power to take action to be worth giving specific bribes to; what may happen is that if someone is friendly to your business, you want to keep them motivated to keep re-running for Congress and do the awful annoying job of being a legislator, when they could instead quit and go back to industry or retire on the beach or whatever.
- nerdponx 3y agoIt's like selling your data to ad tech companies. They'll do it no matter how much you pay for the product.
- astrange 3y agoThey don't, but the important point is: > 2. only rich people will run in the election. Which is not true unless you think AOC is rich. It's not unheard of that congresspeople sleep in their office i.e. are homeless because DC rent is high. https://www.npr.org/2022/12/09/1141635119/the-first-gen-z-member-of-congress-was-denied-a-d-c-apartment-due-to-bad-credit https://www.npr.org/2022/12/09/1141635119/the-first-gen-z-me...
- somsak2 3y ago> congresspeople sleep in their office i.e. are homeless because DC rent is high any source for this? your link just mentions a representative who has bad credit, it never claims he is homeless.
- astrange 3y agoIt's in the second half of the article. > Dozens of members of Congress have even turned their Capitol Hill offices into their makeshift apartments. https://nypost.com/2018/05/01/these-politicians-are-sleeping-in-their-dc-offices-to-save-money/ https://nypost.com/2018/05/01/these-politicians-are-sleeping... Of course, sometimes they're just weird and like it. Mitt Romney lives in a small apartment and only watches TV for fun and he's a multimillionaire.
- hermannj314 3y agoAmerica's GDP allocated per congressperson is like $50 billion each. Salaries wont fix bribes for someone with that much to command and even the already rich can make a lot of money getting into politics. Their salary means nothing to them.
- syndicatedjelly 3y agoGDP per Congressman is a new statistic
- dfadsadsf 3y agoYou need to pay congressmen enough money so they can have upper middle class lifestyle - without that pressure to take bribes is dramatically higher. You have nice 5bdrm house in good school district and enough money for nice vacation + savings? Refusing bribes is easy - you are comfortable. Kids are taken care of. Wife does not have to work. This lifestyle requires 300-600k in DC. You live in shitty 2bdrm apartment with wife and two kids in poor school district? With no savings and vacation? Your life is hell and you are that much more likely to take bribes. It’s all about incentives.
- hinkley 3y agoWe should have about 1000 representatives by now but I think they just didn’t want to retrofit congressional buildings to do it. Of course that would still be 20 billion per congresscritter. But GDP is a bit misleading. A lot of it is financial services lately. It’s not real goods or services.
- amrocha 3y agoThat literally is already what's happening. Bribing officials through lobbying is legal, and only rich people can afford to take on the instability of an election run. And idk where you got the idea that people don't make minimum wage. They absolutely do. Go look at a job board.