Poor Congress. Once again our lawmakers have been backed into a corner and forced to deal with one of the most difficult, agonizing, hand-wringing, teeth-gnashing decisions they ever have to face: Their own pay.
Otherwise brave and courageous members of Congress want to run and hide in a closet when questions of their own pay come up. It`s not that they don`t want the money. Like every other working stiff, they do.
But unlike other working stiffs, they also have to answer to constituents back home. Most, it appears, are scared witless that, no matter how modest the increase may be, it will come back to haunt them in their next election bid.
So how do they do it without touching off a voter backlash? At present, rather than take the heat, they pass the buck.
They pass it to a presidential Commission on Executive, Legislative and Judicial Salaries. If the commission calls for a raise and the President approves it and Congress fails to vote it down in 30 days, it automatically goes into effect. Call it ”dynamic inaction.”
The commission recently suggested a 50 percent increase for consideration by the President. If he approves it in his budget message to Congress on Jan. 9, it would boost their current $89,500 to (ring the cash register) $135,000. But there`s a catch: The lawmakers would have to give up their honorariums, the lucrative fees they receive for speeches and other public appearances. House members can keep up to 30 percent of their salary ($25,850) and senators can keep up to 40 percent ($35,800). The rest they donate to charity.
But even with that giveback, they`re still catching heat. Ralph Nader, for example, calls it ”a shameless salary grab.”
Of course, Nader, by his own accounting, takes in $200,000 a year in speaker`s fees, not including his book royalties. But at least he has to sing for his supper. Members of Congress, if their new increase goes through, will sing less yet make more. No wonder they want to hide rather than go on the record with a vote.
Obviously, Congress would ease public resentment if it would just go a little further. Lawmakers should go ahead and vote themselves a pay increase, but base it on performance.
In every other sector of our society, pay somehow is related to merit. It may seem a bit outlandish to pay $1 million to a basketball player to play a kid`s game, but we also know he would not be earning that much unless he was worth much more in revenues to the team owner. The same is true of million-dollar TV news anchors and movie stars.
Not so in Congress. Members of Congress are paid the same, rain or shine, whether or not unemployment, inflation, the deficit and international drug trafficking are running amok and the country is sinking into pestilence and despair.
Consider, then, the possibilities of a merit system that would reward senators and congressmen for their performance, not their bulljive.
If Congress housed the homeless, balanced the budget, put a serious dent in drug traffic and actually passed rules and regulations that they had to follow like everyone else, they would get their pay raise.
Of course, if they dragged their heels and failed, they would have to give it back. After all, a true merit system also has to have its demerits.
Imagine a system that would penalize congressmen who are linked to misconduct, conflicts of interest and other appearances of impropriety. We could save a lot of money if we paid politicians according to their honesty and candor. Lots of money.
And how about attendance? When I watch C-Span, what are all those empty seats I see most of the time? Where are all our lawmakers anyway? Out getting coffee? Many of us who live and work in the real world get docked if our bosses don`t know where we are. The same should be true of Congress.
For that matter, we could use a little less abuse of franking privileges that allow senators and representatives to use the mails free. I get enough junk mail as it is.
Yes, I am beginning to like this idea of a merit system for congressional pay. The possibilities seem endless, even if the probability does not.
Congressmen and senators don`t mind putting our money where their mouths are. Maybe when it`s their money that hangs in the balance, they would mind their mouths more often.
Of course, you may ask, isn`t merit what elections are supposed to be about? Sure. Maybe that says something about why so many senators and congressmen are so sheepish about asking for a raise.