{"id":4583,"date":"2005-06-30T13:23:37","date_gmt":"2005-06-30T17:23:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/archives\/4583.html"},"modified":"2005-06-30T13:23:37","modified_gmt":"2005-06-30T17:23:37","slug":"at-least-someones-getting-a-raise-redux","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/at-least-someones-getting-a-raise-redux\/","title":{"rendered":"At least someone’s getting a raise — redux"},"content":{"rendered":"

I noted<\/a> yesterday that members of the House approved another boost in their own pay this week, because, in the immortal words of Tom DeLay<\/a>, lawmakers needed “an adjustment so that they’re not losing their purchasing power.”<\/p>\n

I noted that these pay increases, which bring congressional salaries to $165,200, come at a time when the minimum wage hasn’t been increased since 1996 and the real value of the minimum wage is $3.50 below what it was in 1968. Fleshing this out a bit, my friend Eugene Oregon at Demagogue noted today<\/a> just how much congressional salaries have gone up while minimum-wage earners have seen their buying power drop. With some help from Terry at Thinking Rocks<\/a>, we have some pretty interesting information.<\/p>\n

Congressional salary, 1996<\/a> (the last time minimum wage was raised): $133,600<\/p>\n

Congressional salary, today: $165,200<\/p>\n

Total congressional raise since last raise to minimum wage: $31,600<\/p>\n

That’s right — since the last time congress has voted to raise the minimum wage, they have voted themselves raises that total almost 3 times the entire salary of a person working for minimum wage.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Yep, full-time employment at the minimum wage now offers Americans $10,700 a year (about $5,000 below the poverty level for a family of three). Since the last time these low-income workers got an increase, lawmakers’ raises — not the salary, just the raise — is nearly tripple that minimum wage annual total.<\/p>\n

This is a gift of a campaign issue. It’s being delivered to Dems on a silver platter. In a gift-wrapped box. With a pretty little bow on top.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I noted yesterday that members of the House approved another boost in their own pay this week, because, in the immortal words of Tom DeLay, lawmakers needed “an adjustment so that they’re not losing their purchasing power.” I noted that these pay increases, which bring congressional salaries to $165,200, come at a time when the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4583","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4583","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4583"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4583\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4583"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4583"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4583"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}