House Plans $25,000 Pay and Benefits Raises

[Gary Ruskin <gary@essential.org>]

Congressional Reform Briefings			March 17, 1999

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-- Powerful Members of the U.S. House of Representatives are planning
salary and cash benefits raises of as much as $25,000 per year for House
Members, lifting their salaries and cash benefits over $160,000 per
year.

-- House Administration Committee Chairman Bill Thomas (R-CA) is
proposing a $125 tax-free per diem for House Members, worth about
$18,000 to $20,000 per year, and House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-IL) and
Minority Leader Richard Gephardt (D-MO) are supporting a $4,600
congressional pay raise.

-- Please contact your House Members to oppose the congressional pay
raises.  The congressional switchboard phone number is (202) 224-3121. 
E-mail addresses of Members of Congress are available at:
http://www.lib.umich.edu/libhome/Documents.center/congress/conemail.txt

                     NEWS RELEASE

For Immediate Release:		For More Information Contact:
Wednesday, March 17, 1999	Gary Ruskin (202) 296-2787

Groups Criticize Plans for $25,000 Pay and Benefits Hike 
for U.S. House of Representatives

Raise and Per Diem Could Boost House Salary 
and Cash Benefits over $160,000

	Responding to news reports that some Members of the U.S. House of
Representatives want to raise their salaries and cash benefits by as
much as $25,000 per year, Ralph Nader said that "Greed has aggressively
overtaken this Congress.  House leaders have abandoned self-restraint,
and are shamelessly trying to pack their wallets with the people's tax
dollars without even discussing it with the voters back home. Congress
is quickly eroding its moral authority to govern."  

	The Hill reported today that House Administration Committee Chairman
Bill Thomas (R-CA) wants to allow House Members to receive a tax-free
$125 per diem, worth perhaps $18,000 to $20,000 per year, from their
congressional office budgets.  The Thomas per diem plan would amend the
rules governing Members Representational Allowances.  It could be
approved in the Administration Committee, and would not require a House
floor vote.  

	"The Thomas per diem plan is a devious backdoor salary grab," Nader
said. 

	Roll Call reported this week that both House Speaker Dennis Hastert
(R-IL) and Minority Leader Richard Gephardt (D-MO) are also supporting a
$4,600 pay raise for Congress.

	"These pay raise plans are an arrogant and outrageous affront to
American taxpayers," said Gary Ruskin, director of the Congressional
Accountability Project. "House Members do not deserve salaries and cash
benefits worth over $160,000 per year."

	"Congressmen keep bringing up schemes to give themselves more money,"
said Paul Jacob, national director of U.S. Term Limits.  "If they aren't
happy with their jobs, there are plenty of good citizens willing to
serve in their place."

	Members of Congress are already overpaid.  They currently earn a
$136,700 annual salary, plus generous pensions, perks, and other
benefits.  Top leadership earns more. House leaders are supporting
congressional pay raise of 3.4%, which would boost congressional
salaries to $141,300 per year, without the proposed per diem.  Last
year, Members of Congress gave themselves a $3,100 raise, effective
January 1, 1998. 

	During the last ten years, House Members gave themselves five pay
raises, Senators six.  Congressional salaries grew by $47,200 -- more
than $15,000 above inflation.  In 1989, the base congressional salary
was $89,500.

	The Hill reported today that both Speaker Hastert and Minority Leader
Gephardt are discussing the Thomas per diem plan with Members. 
According to The Hill, the $125 per diem would be paid to Members living
outside a 50 mile radius of the Capitol. 

	The federal debt is currently over $5.6 trillion dollars.  "House
Members are wrong to enrich themselves from taxpayer funds, but
especially wrong when our country is so deep in debt," Nader said.

	"While the Congress is diverting attention to the federal deficit, its
leaders are furtively ballooning the congressional deficit, making a
mockery out of the principle that frugality begins at home," Nader said

	"Accumulating a 5.5 trillion dollar national debt, changing our role in
the world from creditor nation to a debtor nation, watching our
educational system sink to the lowest levels of industrialized nations,
allowing Social Security and Medicare to teeter on the brink of
bankruptcy, exporting our good paying manufacturing jobs overseas and
trying to personally destroy one another at every opportunity is hard
work!" said Russell Verney, chairman of the Reform Party.

	"The Republicans and Democrats in Congress want to reward themselves
for these accomplishments by granting themselves a $20,000 tax-free pay
raise.  All Americans can empathize with Congress' desire to keep the
government from taking up 38% of your income.  But, then, they are the
government.  Congress should make the tax code simpler for all of us
instead of using the tax code to give themselves a pay raise. To quote
Mark Twain, ‘There is no distinctively native American criminal class
except Congress," Verney said.

	"Chairman Bill Thomas is the poster boy for greed and arrogance in
Congress," Ruskin said.  "As a phony conservative, he has no respect for
the taxpayers."

	Nader encouraged citizens to support two bills by Rep. Phil English
(R-PA), H.R. 590, to eliminate automatic annual congressional pay
raises, and H.R. 589, to reduce the special tax deduction for the living
expenses of Members of Congress from $3000 to $1.  "Call your House
Members and urge them to oppose increases in congressional pay or
benefits, and to support H.R. 589 and H.R. 590," Nader said.

	"Letting members of Congress draw a $125 tax-free per diem -- without
even voting on it -- would be yet another affront to the hard working
taxpayers who pay their salaries," said Steve Dasbach, national director
of the Libertarian Party.   "Congress doesn't need their pay increased
-- they need to have their pay cut. Let's return to part-time, citizen
legislators who receive most of their pay working a real job back in the
district they represent." 

                        -30-
------------------------------------
Following is an article in the March 17, 1999 issue of The Hill,
available at <http://www.hillnews.com/>.  Reprinted with permission.

Rep. Thomas urges tax-free per diem
By A.B. Stoddard

As House members debate the political risks of raising their salaries,
House Administration Chairman Bill Thomas (R-Calif.) is proposing to
give his colleagues a tax-free per diem that would circumvent a
politically perilous floor vote.

As House Republican leaders consider a cost-of-living adjustment, or
COLA, they are also gauging support among members for an optional per
diem of $125 to cover their lodging and expenses. The money would come
from their current office budgets.

Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) first discussed the controversial
proposal with Minority Leader Richard Gephardt (D-Mo.) more than a month
ago, according to sources. "We have no comment at this time," said
Hastert spokesman John Feehery.

While members said Thomas plans to amend the rules for the members'
representational allowance (MRA) in his committee to avoid a floor vote,
members are seeking to secure a majority in the event the plan comes to
the full House for a vote. 

Gephardt has discussed the plan with members, Democrats said, but has
not indicated whether he would offer his final support to the proposal.
Like Hastert, Gephardt supports a COLA for members.

Thomas and Gephardt were unavailable for comment late Tuesday. 

Per diems are currently paid to members of some state legislatures,
including California, Illinois and New York. The tax-free allotment of
$125-per-day that members said Thomas is advocating would be paid to
those members living outside a 50-mile radius of the Capitol.

With members spending approximately 150 days in legislative session per
year, or roughly 50 percent of their time, they could claim up to
$18,000 to $20,000 in per diems for a year. 

Members currently pay for their transportation to and from their
district with funds from their MRAs. In addition, they are afforded a
special $3,000 deduction off their taxes to offset the costs of
maintaining two residences. 

The Thomas proposal comes during what has become an annual debate over
legislators' paychecks. In 1989, Congress passed the Ethics Reform Act
which boosted member salaries in exchange for the loss of honoraria and
other perquisites. The reforms were supposed to reduce the controversy
over COLAs but that hope has not been realized. 

The last time members received a COLA to their $136,700 salary was a 2.3
percent raise in 1997.

Some members expressed disbelief at the prospect of such a measure
passing without a public floor debate.

"It is beyond me to think anyone thinks you can pass a per diem and do
it without a vote," one Democrat said. "What Thomas is presenting is
unworkable. You can't hide anything and you can't disguise anything. The
problem is they are talking about $18,000, tax free. It is ludicrous to
think that is not going to catch the attention of every government
watchdog group as well as a vast majority of our constituents."

But Rep. Gary Ackerman (D-N.Y.) offered his enthusiastic support for the
idea. "If the committee wants to do that it would be greatly appreciated
by many of the members," he said.

Ackerman, who served in the New York State legislature where he received
a per diem, said members of Congress are treated differently than those
in private business or who work for the government whose business
expenses are covered.

Since members spend their MRAs differently anyway, Ackerman said
deducting an optional per diem would compare to one member leasing a car
and another sending out extra newsletters.

While he acknowledged that some members would find the political price
of accepting a per diem to be too high, Ackerman said those members
should not choose to pay themselves the money.

"Some guys have to cover their expenses and some guys have to cover
their ass — that's really where the vote comes down," he said. "Those
guys who want to beat their chest, then God bless them. They are making
a great contribution and a personal sacrifice over and above what is
being asked of them."

Gary Ruskin of the Congressional Accountability Project said he doubted
the measure would succeed.

"There are very many greedy members of Congress who really would like to
earn $160,000 a year plus generous perks, benefits and pensions, but
this proposal to add $20,000, in effect, to the congressional salary
will incense the American people," Ruskin said.

He added that the plan is "a slap in the face to the American taxpayer
of such large magnitude, it's hard to imagine that it can survive."

Democratic leaders are in a delicate political situation, one Democratic
member said. While they may doubt the plan can work, they don't want to
be seen as unsupportive.

"It's kind of a Catch-22 because you don't want to be seen as someone
not advancing, in a bipartisan manner, the interest of some of the
members," said the member.

The most prudent course of action remains pursuing the COLA, the member
said. 			

"What some of us think is more appropriate is to go after this straight
and honest and have a vote on a COLA, making no apologies for it," he
said. 

One member said he remembered the explosive reaction prompted by a
deduction for members Rep. Dan Rostenkowski (D-Ill.) passed in a tax
bill in the early 1980s when he chaired the House Ways and Means
Committee. 

"It was cataclysmic," said the member of the legislation, which was
repealed one year later. Though some members opted for the deduction he
feared the reaction at home. "I thought it was so bad I didn't want to
have to discuss it with my constituents."
Meredith McGehee, legislative director of Common Cause, which has
traditionally supported pay raises for members, called the per diem plan
"outrageous."

"They do these things and then they wonder why Congress is held in such
low esteem," she said.

McGehee added that the proposal "has the feel and the smell of the House
bank scandal again. Republicans came into control of Congress lamenting
the way Democrats ran the Congress and this sounds like something right
up that alley, except this time the Republicans are in control."

Another hurdle, members noted, is that the plan would upset federal
judges, whose salaries are pegged to those of the members but who cannot
receive per diems. Decoupling member salaries from those other federal
employees would also be politically difficult.

Despite his best effort, one member said, Thomas' plan was not likely to
survive.

"Thomas is very serious about this but the shelf life on this thing is
transparent," he said. "It ends as soon as people find out about it." 
--------------------------------------------------------------------

To read about the proposed $4,600 congressional pay raise, see:
<http://lists.essential.org/cong-reform/msg00005.html>.

The Congressional Accountability Project is a congressional watchdog
group affiliated with Ralph Nader. For more information about
congressional pay and perks, or the Congressional Accountability
Project, see: <http://www.essential.org/orgs/CAP/CAP.html> or send
e-mail to gary@essential.org.

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subscribe CONG-REFORM your name
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Gary Ruskin | Congressional Accountability Project
1611 Connecticut Ave. NW, Suite #3A | Washington, DC 20009
Phone: (202) 296-2787 | Fax (202) 833-2406
http://www.essential.org/orgs/CAP/CAP.html |
mailto:gary@essential.org |
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