I have always heard people make this argument, and since it’s Great British Bake-off time, I’ll use it as the example.
There’s no prize, and the pay per episode is fairly minimal. Less than $500/episode for contestants. Plus, they get ~$2000 stipend for ingredients. On the fly converting pounds to dollars, so these are guesstimates.
What that means is that Great British Bake-off does not find the best home baker in Britain, it finds the best baker who can afford to take time off to be on the show. If you can afford to miss school, work, or being a parent for 12 weeks, you can’t compete.
Same applies here.
If you can’t afford to live on the salary, you’ll only get people in office who don’t need the salary. We already get that to some extent with campaigning costs. This could make it worse. The barrier of entry is higher.
Instead, we need a performance review with real consequences other than “Guess I don’t get re-elected, but I still get a book deal.”
I have always thought it should be twice the average median income of the state they represent.
But you bring up much larger issues. There are so many bars to running for office that make it so much easier for capital holders. I say people who hold capital should be barred from public office. I will leave the exact definition of “holding capital” up to the reader.
I have always heard people make this argument, and since it’s Great British Bake-off time, I’ll use it as the example.
There’s no prize, and the pay per episode is fairly minimal. Less than $500/episode for contestants. Plus, they get ~$2000 stipend for ingredients. On the fly converting pounds to dollars, so these are guesstimates.
What that means is that Great British Bake-off does not find the best home baker in Britain, it finds the best baker who can afford to take time off to be on the show. If you can afford to miss school, work, or being a parent for 12 weeks, you can’t compete.
Same applies here.
If you can’t afford to live on the salary, you’ll only get people in office who don’t need the salary. We already get that to some extent with campaigning costs. This could make it worse. The barrier of entry is higher.
Instead, we need a performance review with real consequences other than “Guess I don’t get re-elected, but I still get a book deal.”
I have always thought it should be twice the average median income of the state they represent.
But you bring up much larger issues. There are so many bars to running for office that make it so much easier for capital holders. I say people who hold capital should be barred from public office. I will leave the exact definition of “holding capital” up to the reader.