Agree. This is on the general public. You don't like dinosaurs serving for 30+ years? Great , we have a mechanism for getting rid of them. It's called voting.
So you would be in favor of abolishing term limits and allowing King Donald to reign for another 20 years?
Now if he wants to have a real discussion and leave the partisan angle out of it (the idea of throwing meat to the rabid dogs of the base just annoys the shit out of me), then my input would be that a pension makes sense if service is over a certain number of years because there is a career that has been put aside to serve in Congress. It doesn’t need to be a salary replacement but I could see it beginning after 6 years and growing until a set number of years. I don’t know if a 401k is the answer because you’re basically asking a guy in his 50s who has served for 12 years to start his private career again when he hasn’t touched it in years. That might be a hard ask without some compensation to backstop.
Sounds like a great setup for a progressive retirement package. We should also include a wealth tax on politicians as part of the bill. Wet dream for democrats. If you accumulated more than $x and accumulated x% of your wealth during your time in office, you receive nothing and have to pay a wealth tax since you somehow benefitted so greatly while being a "public servant."
I understand that, but folks that aren't independently wealthy need a living too. If the gov't gave matching funds for 401k like the private sector, sure. But they don't, at least not in my job. I think folks get bent out of sorts on pensions. Not sure if a Congressional pension works like mine, but I have money taken from my paycheck every month to invest in the pension fund. Interest from the investment & current workers funds those on the pension plan. It's not like it's just a handout.
Workers pay into their pensions & it's invested. It's not a handout. But you have me interested with your suggestion of a wealth tax...seeing how they've been around for centuries. Property tax is a wealth tax.
I have zero problems with pension funds, especially for teachers and police officers. I don't think they should be fully vested for congress after 5 years. A 174K salary should be plenty to field good people. imo
If they are dumb enough to elect him for 20 years, then yes, we'd deserve what we get. But, without term limits, he also loses to Obama.
Got it. I'll just go ahead and write this down for posterity. Unimane is in favor of 20 more years of Donald Trump as President.
Agreed. This isn’t unique to her. And, you can’t make an argument against elected officials becoming rich while in office, but then talk about cutting their salaries and government pensions. Without a salary and a pension, you’re essentially ensuring that they work to enrich themselves, as you leave them little choice, otherwise.
Here, here! I yield the balance of my time to the Gentleman who checks prostates, sometimes as a physician.
Without term limits, I believe Obama is still a two-term President because of precedent. Before FDR, most Presidents just retired after two terms, following in the footsteps of Washington. That said, while it may seem hypocritical, I believe the two term limit on the President is fine, as it is the only nationally held office and wields so much power in one person, vs one of 100 or 437 people. I don't think that amendment can get repealed, thus I am not willing to even fight for it if I am against it. I don't want to compound on it by making it more.
what is wrong with that, if that is what the state of retirement is after his/her presidency? why special treatment?
Because he/she was the defacto head of state for the United States of America. It would be a bad visual. This is why the Presidential pension was enacted, because Truman was basically living in a little house in the middle of Missouri (I think). I find that an ex-POTUS should not be asked to live in such a way, but that is me. And it is such a nonsensically small amount of money (the number of living ex-POTUS' is tiny), it isn't that big of a deal to me.
