The constitutionally created citizens panel that sets pay for Oklahoma legislators has voted to reduce lawmakers’ salaries by 8.8 percent starting after the 2018 election.
The pay cut would reduce most legislators’ base salary from $38,400 to $35,021, although total average compensation is closer to $62,000 a year after travel and meal reimbursement and health and retirement benefits are considered.
The additional pay for House and Senate leadership positions also will be reduced.
We are completely sympathetic with the public’s frustrations with their Legislature. The recently completed special session demonstrated amply that there are members who aren’t worth the time of day, much less $62,000 a year.
That said, we’re still waiting for a rational explanation for how paying legislators less will produce a better Legislature.
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It’s easy to see how it would produce a less diverse, less representative Legislature. If you reduce the pay, you reduce the portion of the population who can afford to take the job. You end up with a chamber filled with the wealthy and the corruptible.
“This is easier for me, because I don’t need my legislative salary, and I don’t run for my legislative salary,” Rep. Jon Echols, R-Oklahoma City, told reporters after the decision.
So, if we want more lawmakers like Echols — one of the architects of the special session’s general appropriations bill that cut appropriations and made the state even more dependent on one-time funding gimmicks — by all means, let’s cut their pay.
An 8.8 percent pay cut for legislators satisfies the urge to kick a bad guy while he’s down, but it isn’t a solution to the problem. The solution is to stop electing bad legislators. Good ones are worth the price.
