Am I mistaken? I thought most political position are paid positions. Currently north of $150,000 USD for members of congress, I think?
I think the vast majority of US elected positions are unpaid or have a small nominal stipend, but, yes, federal elected officials are all paid (the salary, and even more the total comp, are...pretty minimal compared to the private sector for the kind of responsibilities involved.)
>pay for [...] research
Thanks for the laugh.
They might read research, but they aren't personally funding it.
You may wish to read up on the subject of government work, salaries, etc. before you go debating about it on the net. Most of this stuff is covered in early Civics classes, and as someone who presumably pays taxes, you might be interested in finding out where and how those dollars get distributed!
might read, or have someone else tell them the important bits. This cost money either way
> Through your taxpaying dollars, just like every other government worker?
If this were the case, why are the politicians even trading stocks to begin with? if they wanted money why not be a private individual and then there would be no scrutiny on trading stocks.
I was trying to clear up your confusion that staff (and other expenses) were paid out of a congresspersons $150,000 salary (which is also a bit higher than that btw).
I am trying to assert that political machines require money. Taxpayer money is one avenue the stock market is another.
I am also saying that the money allocated, by taxpayer money, may not be enough. One way to alleviate this tension is investing in the stock market.
If I am not mistaken, if this ban passes, would they not also vote to increase their salaries? (I would think so, because a source of income was made illegal) So, to conclude, I don't want to give more money to politicians. Let them make money in the stock market and actually enforce the laws already in place that governs their trades.
What is this hunch based on, given that you didn't know they had another $1,000,000+ to spend?
Politicians trade stocks
Homer's Brain: Twenty dollars can buy many peanuts.
Homer: Explain how!
Homer's Brain: Money can be exchanged for goods and services.
Mr. Cole: That money could be put to use, to gain more money.
Paul: Explain how!
Mr. Cole: Money can be exchanged for stocks and bonds. The value of these securities shifts over time. Performing analysis on these securities can help you produce probabilities on how the value may change.
At the first-ever minimum salary for Congressional (non-intern) staff (which actually doesn't go into effect until September), it could actually pay the salary for 22 people with a little left over.
And lots of work is done by interns, who now do get some pay ($20k is allocated to each House office and $50k to each Senate office of this purpose annually), but not much.
(Yes, any private employer doing this would have the Labor Department all over them for wage and hour violations. Guess who those rules don't apply to?)
https://crsreports.congress.gov/
You can also read them, they're pretty comprehensive and exhaustively cited.
They don't. The $174k-193k (the latter for certain leadership positions) is their salary. They also have individual staff budgets, and there are shared services with their own budgets (CRE, CBO, etc.)