Part I
Did you know that the Federal Govt. spends about $91,687,500.00 (that’s nearly $92 million, for those of us who don’t often see numbers bigger than 4 or 5 digits) a year on the salaries of 551 people?
Did you know that our president makes $400,000 a year? (sources: 1, 2) The average US salary in 2002 was $36,764 (ask.yahoo).
Let’s compare that to the Presidents and Prime Ministers of other nations (in US dollars):
- Mexico: was $245,000 (new President’s salary not announced yet). Mexican minimum wage salary (couldn’t find annual average salaries): about $8/day, or $3,000 a year.
- Canada: PM was $123,500 (USD) in 2004. Avg. Canadian salary: $40,000 (USD) (source).
- I’m trying to get Japan’s numbers too.
Anyway, my numbers are not going to be exact because I’m taking info from places that seem reputable after really quick google searches. I’m not trying to be totally scientifically accurate. I just want to show the trends.
This means that our President officially makes 11 times what the average American makes. The Mexican president made much more: 81 times more than their minimum wage earners during a good year, granted my data is probably pretty off. The Canadian Prime Minister makes only 3 times that of the average Canadian.
The moral of this story? I don’t know. Maybe “I’m glad we’re not Mexico and I wish we were more like Canada” ?
Part II
Did you know that US Govt. salaries increase every year (in 2001, it increased by about $4,000) unless they vote to block it?
I didn’t either (2001 about.com article explaining how it happens).
Now, on the one hand, I understand that US congresspersons must maintain homes in more than one location, and they have all kinds of work-related and personal stresses that come with a job that literally doesn’t end at 5pm each day like our jobs do. However, i can’t help but wonder if it would be cheaper if the government paid for Washington-area homes for our representatives and gave a lower salary.
Lastly, did you know that Hillary Clinton proposed a bill to amend the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 to tie the national minimum wage increase to the percentage increase that congress receives every year? It’s called the Standing with Minimum Wage Earners Act of 2006 and I kind of like it. While it doesn’t address the fact that congress makes a ton of money each year, it would guarantee that next time congress fails to stop itself from getting a pay increase this year, we’ll get a minimum wage increase by the same percentage.
The pessimistic side of me wouldn’t be surprised if congress finally starts voting to stop their (and our) wage increase if this bill passes.
Anyway, this is just stuff I ran across and started to investigate for kicks. Really. I enjoy this kind of stuff.
xjaymanx | 05-Dec-06 at 6:29 pm | Permalink
unfortunately, there are even more complications than that… for example, the effect of mexicans illegally crossing into the US and influencing our economy… may not be a huge factor, but i’m sure it lowers the US average (and maybe raises the mexican average)…
plus canadians get taxed a hell of lot more than the US… so i’d love to see the after-tax averages as well…
not to mention, differences in cultural standards of living… tokyo has been in the top-2 most-expensive cities in the world consistently for over a decade or two… so japan’s salary averages might be higher… in this case, i’d love to some way to compare these standards of living as apples to apples…
similarly, perhaps larger more-populous nations require governments to have a larger budget… maybe not… i’d still like to see the proportions…
lol, sorry for my temporary verbosity :)
xander | 06-Dec-06 at 5:38 am | Permalink
stuff i’ve looked up.
a japanese prime minister apparently makes slightly less than the us president (43 million yen, or 374,000 USD) according to this site.
although the current japanese prime minister volunteered to cut his own pay by 30%, according to this speech made in 2006, but who knows if he’s done it or not.
we were talking about GDP and population earlier, too.
the population of mexico is about 1/3 of that of the united states (107 million, to about 300 million), and canada has about a third of the population of mexico (roughtly 33 million).
and japan stands in the middle, at about 127 million.
so based on population, it evens out.
looking at GDP (gross domestic product), mexico and canada are about even, standing at 1.06 and 1.11 trillion, respectivly, where as the us stand at about 12 trillion.
japan in between, with about 4.025 trillion.
(source)
so based on econmy and population, these seem to be even and fair. of cours, as the person above stated, taxes, cost of living, etc, not withstanding.
also, oregon has that thing hilary is proposing. we voted it in in ‘96 i believe. which is why oregon has the second highest minimum wage in the nation.
emily | 06-Dec-06 at 8:16 am | Permalink
governments having a larger budget is pretty different from the salaries governments pay their officials.
And you’re right. I haven’t compared ‘apples to apples’ or anything like that because it’s pretty hard to do that on a prelim. search. I did the best I could to show what I found however. Hopefully someone will run with this and do more research.
alastair noble | 06-Dec-06 at 8:19 pm | Permalink
Two cents worth.. New Zealand has a population of just a little over four million. To put that in perspective our economy compared to yours on a per capita GDP basis is 2/3’s the size.
We pay our Prime Minister a salary of $240,000 US. The average wage here is $23,000 US.
Most disturbing to me as a tax payer are the following, we also throw in a further $6k expenses per year. Free limo travel everywhere for anything FOR LIFE! Free international travel anywhere for anything FOR LIFE! And a generous lifetime pension of $65k US.
Each year Parliamentarians receive a average wage rise of 4.8% adjusted retrospectively ( ie: applied to the year gone so back dated, as well as going forward).
All this in a country where our liberal government dishes money out left right and centre to such things as national “hip hop” tours by NZ Artists, and a scoial security structure which would almost be unbelievable to any American with its scale, generosity and lack of transperency.
All this from my paying 39 cents in the dollar across all forms of income. And 12.5% sales tax. And a variety of other entrenched non standard forms of taxation probably equivalent roughly to another 7% of anual salary.
emily | 07-Dec-06 at 9:16 am | Permalink
@xjaymanx,
your “temporary verbosity” is always welcome. In fact I wish it was more regular!
@alastair,
wow… yeah I knew there probably were very few countries who had a fair government system… but I think NZ takes the boobie prize right now.