Comments on: Congressional Pay .vs. Federal Minimum Wage

by: 2007 federal income tax forms and instuctions

Thu, 24 Apr 2008 08:20:56 +0000

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by: larrymt

Wed, 13 Feb 2008 04:02:38 +0000

Finally there is some sense in what I am reading and I do appreciate all of your blogs. I think that you are right on tract. We need to control congressional wages along with perks, put them on Social Security and invest in their oun 401k programs. What we need now is for everyone out there to write it up for an email posting and then mail it to all your friends and neighbors and out there there must be someone who would be willing to start the right process. A groundswelling movement of monumental proportions is what it is going to take. I’m going to do it yet tonight. Let’s all do it and see how far it goes and maybe we can vote on their wages after all don’t we hire them?

by: Matt

Mon, 08 Oct 2007 04:25:49 +0000

Why does it anger people to know that there are rich people getting richer? Yes Congress needs to trim the fat everywhere. However, minimum wage is kept low because of union agreements/inflation. The value of the dollar is weakening as is. You people complain about the price of everything and want more money to pay for it, please realize that one side goes up the other surely will too. Then you will be right back where you were to start.
Why does it go up? Because it would cost business more to pay their employees = higher prices so that they can maintain their profit margin = less you can afford and then you want another raise to buy more junk (cyclic!). On top of that more tax money accumulated. How do you think the “government” pays for everything? Why do you think they are reckless with the national budget? Because it is not there money, it’s yours. There is an attempt to lower this effect of unchecked inflation, yet it is the wrong approach.
As far as taxes go, the rich get a bigger break because they pay more. Top 1% pay 39% of the taxes in the country. 49% of the nation pays NO taxes; they get money every year from the other 51%. Health care, lawsuits, government spending, etc… All contributes to the fact that you will never see and end to the means. Look into the Fair tax system for some alternatives to national budge woes. Look into your representative’s track record for how he/she stands on issues that matter to your banking account. SS/ Medicare/ Medicaid, etc…. all of these plans cost us money. You want to save for retirement? Do it privately, the only thing the government has done well is pave roads. If you are relying on the government you are a sheep following the wrong shepherd. The private sector has brought everything that is of value to this country. Yet it is punished the most (taxes, etc.).

by: ChrisWeigant.com » Blog Archive » A Challenge To Pelosi And Reid On Minimum Wage

Tue, 01 May 2007 03:14:09 +0000

[…] For the last 17 years, Congress has received a yearly automatic raise, except when their collective altruism arises to deny themselves extra money. This has actually happened (at least five times), mostly during the early years of the Republican takeover (’94, ‘95, ‘96, ‘97, and ‘99). I can’t vouch for its accuracy, but here is an interesting table of congressional salaries versus the minimum wage that goes back to 1938. […]

by: Jack Coleman

Sun, 15 Apr 2007 00:59:29 +0000

Did you know that our government sponsors and trains dictators to take over countries and wreak havoc, then later accuses them of crimes and hangs them or in other ways eliminates them? Did you know that the GOV (that is, the ultra rich and their henchmen) are stealing our Soc Security by keeping the world in a constant turmoil so they can justify waging war, and therefore justify defense spending which makes them and their buddies money while driving up the deficit. Its not blacks against whites, its not the international terrorists, its not aids or drugs or other stuff the ultra-rich-owned media wants us to focus on. It’s the terrorists in Washington who run our country. How they pay themselves is an indicator of their concern for us. All Americans need to realize these things (read Noam Chomshky’s book, “Hegemony or Survival”) and begin organizing for third party candidates for the next election. We need to plan an international day of protest against the US Government (an international labor strike against all US-owned businesses?), we need to let them know that we know. There is no Democratic or Republican party, there’s only the ultra-rich, ultra-greedy people who manipulate the world, literally, for their own benefit. And they continually rip us and the rest of the world a new one. Start caring, start telling.

by: Rev. Lyle M. Miller, Sr

Mon, 19 Feb 2007 20:33:34 +0000

I hate to say it, but it seems to me than few folk if, if any are interested in having members of Congress, the President, Vice President, and all of their staff have to toe the line like the rest of us ordinary citizens. We need to remind folks that those elected officials work for us and unless we stand up and take notice that we are not going to let them live high any longer we will be in the same place years from now.

by: Rev. Lyle M. Miller, Sr

Wed, 14 Feb 2007 15:00:36 +0000

No, I don’t think that Social Security payments are too low. My reasoning for the suggested action is that for too long members of Congress have had life their own way. For example in 2007 members of Congress enjoy a salary of $168,000.00 per year and this ultimately translates in to a retirement package of almost the same amount annually after something like six years in office. Any of the rest of us are required to work at a place of employment for some 20, 30, or 40 years before we can retire. The annual pay for the President recently went from $200,000.00 per year to $400,000.00 per year with added perks such as a tax exempt expense fund to say nothing of all the free travel on Airforce One. No, my purpose in suggesting a lowering of their salaries and other fringe benefits is take the first step in requiring them to live a little more like the human beings they are supposed to be representing. Out government has gotten so far out of touch with the realities of life it is pitiful.

by: restless

Wed, 14 Feb 2007 09:15:26 +0000

Do you think that Social Security payments are too low? Is that why you want Presidential and Congressional salaries lowered and their pensions removed? They do have a bad habit of giving themselves salary increases and perks while turning a semi-deaf ear to the rests of us, but a Constitutional Amendment? If a flag-burning Amendment can’t get passed, I doubt a sarlary Amendment will.

by: Rev. Lyle M. Miller, Sr

Tue, 13 Feb 2007 17:19:00 +0000

I read these bloggs and to date haven’t found one that is on track for making corrections in our system. If members of Congress had to pay Social Security Taxes along with all the other staff members and the President, things might change drastically. A national patition calling for such action would be in order. Finally, require members of Congress, the President and all staff members to contribute to their own 401K and bring and end to the outlandish pensions those folks are given. Unless they begin to feel the pinch like the rest of us ordinary folk in this country, little will be done to make any changed that is significant.

by: Rev. Lyle M. Miller, Sr

Sat, 10 Feb 2007 14:52:05 +0000

I just came to your blog by accident as I have been interested in the salaries and other perks that our elected officials and staff in Washington, DC have at the expense of the taxpayers. Out of reason are the salaries of all, including the President and V.P. along with members of Congress, especially when we consider that they do not contribute to Social Security and have big pensions guaranteed all the while that they claim to be interested in the welfare of the general public. I would like to suggest a campaign to pass a Constitutional Ammendment to require all of them to pay into Social Security and also to contribute to a 401K Retirement Plan and cut them off of the current retirement guarantees of thousands and thousands of dollars a year. This would go a long way to solving the Social Security problem. Lastly, I would like to see something enacted one way or another to require these folks who have had all the perks to have to live for a couple of years on a Social Security Benefit based on their Contributions for a coupld of years, even while they are serving in Congress or the Whitehouse. This might go a long way to getting them to spend more time working towards the betterment of society than sitting around the halls of Congress fighting over a lot of stuff that doesn’t amount to a hill of beans for the common folk in America.

by: restless

Thu, 25 Jan 2007 18:01:55 +0000

Thanks, and I appreciate the added info. I do believe, as you have proved in your own life and in your business, that if an individual is very disciplined and persistent, he or she can eventually succeed and do well. And the earlier you start, the earlier you have a chance of that success. But there’s more to what you say than just hard work. I’ve been reading Martin Seligman’s Authentic Happiness, a treatise on what truly leads to individual happiness. Seligman discovered that making use of one’s core “virtues” (i.e., strengths — for more info on your own core strengths, take Seligman’s free test, the VIA Core Strengths Test, at www.authentichappiness.sas.upenn.edu/) in one’s job and outside life makes for more lasting happiness than the so-called “pleasures” (e.g., listening to music, watching tv, playing a video game, making love, going on a vacation). This dovetails with Mike Csikszentmihalyi’s theory of “flow,” which is defined as the time when you are doing something and are so at one with it that you lose track of time, that you never want it to end. Both of these concepts apply to the world of work, to one’s “calling.” I can tell by what you’ve said that you are answering your calling and have from a young age. This is the best way to live, isn’t it? The people you give a chance to and under-perform for you can’t be happy just barely getting by. And if you are treating them as fairly as your response indicates, then it’s obvious they are mistaking passing pleasure for long-term happiness and that any wage you paid them would not make them better at what you hired them to do.

by: Mike H

Thu, 25 Jan 2007 16:30:48 +0000

my kid doesn’t own an ipod, and ALL of my long term employees make good wages. but a restaurant can only pay people a certain amount. Hamburgers don’t cost $15 each. Basically, the average cost of a lunch dictates about what the average wage in a restaurant can be. I care very much about my employees actually, and want them all to succeed. Working in a restaurant does not spell long term success most of the time. I was an employee for 16 years and while i was very poor going to college I kept my debt at zero and delayed gratification while my friends went on vacations and into debt. Most of them still work as hourly employees unfortunately and are in poor financial health. Educating our society and raising our children to have work ethics and financial conservatism will lead to most people not caring what the minimum wage is because they will not have to. Most of my employees are not “tweekers” but too many come in the door, i give them a chance (not always at minimum wage) and about 70% of the time they cost me more than they add to the value of my business and then they are gone because “this work is too hard”. Been working in this business since i was 14 making $2.85/hour and am a normal guy of normal strength, never been too hard for me. I was raised very poor and my parents were on welfare often. Anyone can get out of the mire if they really are willing to get themselves out. Thanks for the dialogue Restless.

by: restless

Thu, 25 Jan 2007 11:43:19 +0000

You know, I gotta comment on your bitter attitude toward your employees. What’s up with that? Do your customers know how you feel about the people you employ? Sure they do. Why? Because your employees know how you feel about them and that filters down to their service to your customers. I know that most small business people are petty dictators and there are reasons for that, but there’s a reason that Starbucks doesn’t pay min wage and offers heallth benefits to their barristas: it filters down to the service they give customers. In other words: give a little, get a little or more than a little. Btw, how many ipods do your kids own?

by: Mike H

Thu, 25 Jan 2007 04:56:17 +0000

I own a restaurant and employ about 70 people. Most of them this is their first job and they average 18 years of age. Anyone in this country who is worth their weight in french fries can make more than minimum wage. Call me if u r any good. I’ll pay you $10/hour or more if you are worth a damn. I should not, however, have to pay high school kids and tweekers more than minimum wage so they can quit in the first three months before they even know what the heck they are doing. There are less than 300,000 ADULTS in this country making minimum wage. some Kid does not need a raise just so he can buy attachments to his IPOD with his almost completely discrecionary income. PEACE OUT

by: David Marquardt

Mon, 15 Jan 2007 18:33:47 +0000

Interesting table. I’d love to see some additional comparisons when you factor in all the other rediculous “retirement” benefits that congress after just a few years of “service”.
David