Salaries
I noticed this a while back, but Colin McEnroe’s post brought it back to my attention: legislative staff salaries came out via an FOI request from Ken Dixon, and are viewable here.
Notable:
- House Democrats have $32K of staff costs per legislator.
- House Republicans have $70K of staff costs per legislator.
- Senate Democrats have $177K of staff costs per legislator.
- Senate Republicans have $213K of staff costs per legislator.
And fueling “McKinney Congressional Run” talk, angry former Shays staffer Brenda Kupchick has landed a job with the Senate Republican caucus. As the Republican caucuses keep shrinking, it’s notable whenever new staff come on, because the operation doesn’t really have any logical reason to expand – especially when the new staffers don’t come from the Hartford area, as most do.
So with that in mind, let me make a modest proposal: the legislature should establish a fixed per-legislator budget for the House and Senate caucus staffs, indexed to inflation (or, more entertainingly, to the current minimum wage). Caucuses should be able to allocate their staff budgets however they like – a few high-paid staffers, a vast army of low-paid ones, or anything in-between.
The current legislative salaries, if the FOI report is comprehensive, total up to $13.8 million. But setting a staff budget of $32,000 per House member and $177,000 per Senator would immediately save $2.5 million, and we’re looking for all the millions we can get in this difficult budget season.
UPDATE 1/28/09: Dixon posted the wages of the sessional employees as well, and if you total up the pay in each session (105 days in the odd-numbered years, 64 days in the even-numbered years), and divide by two for a yearly average, the staff costs change as follows:
- House Democrats have
$32K$36.5K of staff costs per legislator. - House Republicans have
$70K$75.2K of staff costs per legislator. - Senate Democrats have
$177K$191.5K of staff costs per legislator. - Senate Republicans have
$213K$225.1K of staff costs per legislator.
The gap widens by about $2,000 per year on the House side, and closes by about $2,000 a year on the Senate side.