We have all this screaming on the right and by business about how raising the minimum wage costs jobs. Of course, I was just listening to David Dreier of CA trying to justify the low wages people have to take in a service economy and how overall it is good for the American economy.
I doubt in an environment where we have an administration that wants to change the definition of mnaufacturing jobs to include assembling hamburgers will be all that sympathetic with the plight of workers, and certainly few currently in the Congress have ever had to struggle to make ends meet, and impossible task on the minmum wage.
So maybe it's time we change that. let me give you some figures to consider.
I have pulled 3 sets of figures ... I won't do the complete chart, but just a snapshot, to give you a sense. I will provide a year, 3 salaries, and 2 ratios. Since I am not that good in html, please bear with me as to how they are presented.
For each year I will give the minimum wage, followed by the Congressional salary, the ratio of those two (Congressional salary divided by minimum wage), and the presidential salary followed by the ratio of it (presidential salary) to minimum wage. Since the presidential salary was raised to 200,000 in 1979, it has been raised only once, to 400,000 in 2001. Since all 3 pay rates -- aslaries in Congress and of the president as well as the rate for minimum wage - are set by the Congress, that should be the real comparison.
- 3.35 / 69,800 / 20,836 / 200,000 59,701
- 3.35 / 125,100 / 37,343 // 200,000 / 50,701
- 4.25 / 133,600 / 31,435 // 200,000 / 47,059
- 4.25 / 141,300 / 33,247 // 200,000 / 47,059
- 5.25 / 145,100 / 28,175 // 400,000 / 79,028
- 5.25 / 157,000 / 30,485 // 400,000 / 79,028
Since 1982 Congress has increased its rate of pay so that the ratio is now about 1.5 times what it was then.
So here's my tongue in cheek proposal.
Perhaps we pass a new Constitutional amendment (since proposals seem to be in vogue) limiting the annual pay of Congress to no more than 20,000 times the hourly rate of the minimum wage, and insisting that presidential pay be in the range of 2.5 to 2.7 times that of Congressional pay.
Were we to use the currenet minimum wage of 5.15, Congress would be limited to a mximum pay of 103,000, and the president would be paid in the range of 257,500 - 278,100. We could argue that both branches would complain that their pay was being cut severely, but after all, they have an option for them to consider. We could take the current Congressional pay of 157,000 and work from that.
Then we would come up with a minimum wage of 7.85 and the president would be paid from 392,500 - 423,900.
Remember, constitutional amendments do not have to start in Congress. The states could issue a call for a constitutional convention --- if 3/4 of them issue the call, then such a convention is called -- although it could not be limited to the subject at hand. And I believe that we got within one or two states on the call for such a convention on the proposed balanced budget amendment.
BTW someone who was paid for 2,000 hours at even the new minimum wage, with no overtime or paid benefits, would be earning the princely sum of 15,700.
I offer my proposal to simply raise the following point. I do NOT think Congress should be allowed to benefit itself and its own members until addresses the needs of all Americans, including those for whom the only option is minimum wage jobs.
We could, I suppose, tie Congressional and presidential pay to economic growth, or balanced federal budgets, or any other thing.
As a school teacher, I resent like hell that what I do has to be measured by gross instruments such as the tests mandated by NCLB. I think we need some way to measure the performance of Congress. And I think it is about time that they start paying attention not only to those who can write 2,000 checks, but to those whose needs are at the lowest level of Maslow's hierarchy -- basic survival.
Just a passing thought at the end of a very long day.