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Comment by somenameforme | Hacker News Reader

An even more interesting one is that Ford was the first president to go on paid speaking tours after office. It's not like the 37 other presidents couldn't have also cashed in on the office in a similar fashion, but it was felt that such a thing would impugn the integrity of the office and also undermine the perception of somebody working as a genuine servant of the state.

There has most certainly been a major decline in values over time that corresponds quite strongly with the rise in the perceived importance of wealth.

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Curious if part of this was the overall decline in government compensation relative to the private sector. The president makes roughly what the typical SV engineer makes after 5 years in big tech or as a fresh grad from a top PhD program. Meanwhile the people the president deals with have become unfathomably wealthy.

In 1909, the US president made 75k - roughly 2.76 Million in today's dollars. This is in comparison to the current 400k dollar salary of the president. As the president is the highest paid government employee by law/custom - this applies downward pressure on the rest of the governments payroll.

I see no reason why the president shouldn't be modestly wealthy given the requirements or the role and the skill required to do it well. Cutting the payscale to less than some new grads seems like a recipe for corruption.

Since 1958 with the Former Presidents Act [1] the Presidency guarantees you'll live very comfortably for the rest of your life with a lifetime pension (and even a small pension for your wife), funding for an office/staff, lifetime secret service protection, funded travel, and more. It was passed precisely because of the scenario you describe playing out with Truman who was rather broke, and ran into financial difficulties after leaving office.

[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Former_Presidents_Act

> Truman who was rather broke, and ran into financial difficulties after leaving office.

Nope[0]. He was a shameless grifter just like Trump.

[0] https://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2026/01/the-immortal-le...

Your source does not seem aware of the history of tax brackets. In Truman's era the top rate started at $100k income and was 90%. Even at $60k it was 80%. Those are figures from 1953, when Truman left office. [1]

This wasn't that big of a deal for the average person at a time when the median salary was somewhere around $3k, but for a person with significant overhead and large, but not enormous, income -- in other words, exactly like Truman -- it was devastating.

[1] - https://taxfoundation.org/data/all/federal/historical-income...

> Your source does not seem aware of the history of tax brackets.

"Beginning in 1949, the president was also granted a $50,000 (equivalent to $677,000 in 2025) expense allowance, which was initially tax-free, and did not have to be accounted for."[0] That's 4 years of $677,000 tax-free which I make to be about $2.7M which lines up with "Truman embezzled about two and half million dollars, in 2025 money, from the White House expense account"[1] - "tax-free", "did not have to be accounted for" -> tax brackets are meaningless.

But, you say, "the allowance became taxable later in his presidency"[0], and I reply "Truman never reported it on his tax return"[0], "and also didn’t pay the taxes he owned on the money."[1] which also somewhat scuppers the "history of tax brackets" angle, no?

Further, "In February 1953, Truman signed a book deal for his memoirs, and in a draft will dated December of that year listed land worth $250,000 (equivalent to $3,008,000 in 2025), savings bonds of the same amount, and cash of $150,000 (equivalent to $1,805,000 in 2025)"[0] which I reckon comes to about $8M which, again, lines up with "Truman had a net worth of about $8 million in 2025 dollars when he left the White House"[1].

Further, further, "In January 1959, Truman calculated his net worth as $1,046,788.86 (equivalent to $11,561,000 in 2025)"[0] which, to be fair, is slightly lower than the "$14 million in 2025 dollars when he was successfully shaking his tin cup to Sam Rayburn and John McCormack in 1958"[1] but in the same "NOT AT ALL POOR GTFO" ballpark.

In summary - he embezzled $2.5M, got $8M for your memoirs, and ending up being worth $11-14M within 6 years of leaving the White House and thus I rate the claim "Truman who was rather broke, and ran into financial difficulties after leaving office" as 100 Pinocchios.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_S._Truman (look at "Financial Situation")

[1] https://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2026/01/the-immortal-le...

Wikipedia is not a source. All of the dirt on that page is exclusively relying on one article [1] from a self-citing author, the same author you again cited in your post here, from 'lawyersgunmoney.' I don't find it compelling. It may indeed ultimately turn out to be accurate, but I find it generally unwise to rewrite history on the words of a single person, who seems to have a strong bias towards a certain narrative.

That bias could indeed just be because he believes he's discovered a truth which most people don't know, completely contrary to the 'official narrative', which is indeed quite a frustrating place to find oneself. But it can also cause one to be blind in some ways. For instance assuming everything as written is accurate, the author simply then jumps to malice (like tax evasion), seemingly without consideration of issues such as inconsistent or flawed record keeping which I imagine was extremely common in the days prior to computers.

[1] - https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/07/the-truman-show.html

Are most fresh grads from a top PhD program really making $400k/year? Sure, the ones hired by OpenAI are making at least that much, but the vast majority are not. However the broader point remains, that the president’s (and the rest of government’s) pay structure has not kept up with the private sector.

>There has most certainly been a major decline in values over time that corresponds quite strongly with the rise in the perceived importance of wealth.

Are you sure that people in the past viewed wealth as less important? If anything, the 1960s hippie movement would represent a shift away from a cultural emphasis on wealth, no?

I would suggest that internet commenter nihilism and politician nihilism form a self-reinforcing spiral. If commenters will take a nihilistic view of your actions no matter what you do, you might as well secure the bag. And if politicians are always securing the bag, you might as well write nihilistic internet comments about them.

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