In the sense that government should realize that they are in competition with business for good people, yes. If you pay politicians crap, you’ll get those who are rich and don’t care about the money, failures in private life, or expecting to make connections to cash in when they leave. In plenty of countries they pay cops a pittance, and the cops make up for it through bribery or theft. Is that how you want government to work?
Hmm- I love it, free USPS mail service for everybody. Well, for everybody’s “official business”. The franking privilege is one of the biggest perks MCs have.
I am not talking Social Security.
I’m talking about the Federal Employees’ Retirement System. Where can I get some of that action?
Can we separate what the entitlements are? Are we now talking about a pay scale? I was talking about how deals get done. Since those deals transcend the Congress, why should they be private?
Talking about the rights and privileges of Congress goes far beyond pay. Do teachers get what they deserve? They do far more for this country than Congress (for far less)
By becoming a federal employee. You’re complaining that you don’t get the same job benefits as employees of the federal gov’t, and that’s somehow unfair? I mean, I don’t get the same benefits as the employees of Microsoft either.
Plus, I don’t really see how your Amendment would fix that. I seriously doubt that any Judge would read that Amendment as affecting how Congress compensate its employees.
I mean, Congressional salaries are set by law to. Do you honestly think that everyone should be mandated by the Constitution to get paid the same as their Congressmen? That seems, well, kinda communist.
This thread is getting silly.
It is your stance then, that no differences exist?
I already named one difference, Congress members have to join the Health Insurance exchanges when they wouldn’t have to if they were non-Congress folks with similar benefits. So obviously there are differences. They just aren’t difference created to create the kind of unfair perk you seem to invision in your OP.
My stance is that we’re on post #26 and you still haven’t articulated exactly what the problem is you’re trying to solve. You guess that there must be laws that apply to us that don’t apply to congress, but your not sure what those laws are or why they’re a problem. You are, however, of the opinion that we need an Amendment to prohibit this thing which may or may not be happening.
So again, what law exempts Congressfolk that you feel is unfair and justifies a constitutional Amendment?
It is my stance that differences do exist, and there is nothing wrong with that.
Is it your stance that everyone should make as much as a Congressman?
Oooo. Why hasn’t this passed?
Credit where it’s due. Closing congressional exemptions like this was one of the things Newt Gingrich worked on when he was Speaker of the House back in the nineties.
First, teachers don’t get paid enough, not by a long shot, but I think an individual congressperson can do more good (and more bad) than an individual teacher. That is not knocking teachers in the slightest.
Do you think the nations business would be done better with all negotiations televised? How many people actually have the time (and the training) to understand the issues. How many people have aides to brief them on issues, and to read and summarize bills for them? People respond to sound bite and simplistic labels - see Death Panels. People who don’t have to deal with the direct consequences - most of us - won’t see the benefits of compromise, which is what politics is all about. With no compromise we can easily go to extremes. If negotiations are open, any member of a party compromising will get beat up by the extremists (happened with the Republicans who were working out a health care compromise) and so they will harden their stance for political survival.
In California we have let the people vote directly on way too many laws, and the people are swayed by ads and lies and soundbites. It’s been a disaster. Is that what you want for the country?
Cool. I’m looking forward to that $50k a year salary, research staff, guard detail, and expensed flights!
The reason that government officials have a health care plan is for the same reason that 99% of everyone has a health care plan. The organization they work at has one. This isn’t particularly remarkable.
What kind of benefits do state representatives or small town mayors get?
One huge factor is that politicians are for the most part, lawyers. This means they all have been trained to “think alike.” I don’t mean they’re all robots but they come from the same “School.” Think of it like kids that go to Catholic School vs Public School. Certainly you can get the same educations but there’s a method to the teaching that still comes through.
Because most politicians are lawyers they go through that methodology to get their law degrees. This influences them when they go into politics.
Now-a-days it cost so much to run for an election. It’s estimated to cost about 20 million on average to RUN for a US Senate seat. This is not counting the primaries before.
So you don’t need to be rich, but you need a rich backer, or Oprah Winfrey or in some cases both 
I agree that all government officials should be offered the industry standard in terms of wages and benfits.
Of course the logic is, “But then the best candidates won’t run.” Well the “best” don’t run now.
All we have now is politicians that know how to manipulate a system to get elected. Voters don’t care because in reality there’s not that much difference. Even though the Republicans and Democrats fight a lot, if you compare side by side, there’s not much difference. This is because as soon as one party falls out of favour it simply adopts whatever platfor the “in power” party opposes.
We lack visonaries in this country. It’s too easy to promise then say “Sorry, couldn’t deliver, and the voters time and time, forgive this.” And when you have an honest candidate who points out the person won’t be able to deliver, they are ignored. And even later when proved right, the voters don’t care.
Henry Clay once said, “I’d rather be right than President."
Can you imagine anyone in today’s poltical climate saying that? 
They’ll all say it.
They won’t mean it, but they’ll say it.