Congressional Pay Cut? Arizona Democrat Suggests One to Nancy Pelosi

Sept. 17, 2010 -- As the national debt climbs over $13.5 trillion, the unemployment rate hovers near 10 percent and Congress considers extending the Bush-era tax cuts, one House Democrat says it is time to lead by example, calling for a five percent cut to congressional salaries.

Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick, D-Arizona, introduced a bill, H.R. 4720, the Taking Responsibility for Congressional Pay Act, last March, but it has stalled in committee. On Thursday, Kirkpatrick wrote Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, calling for a floor vote on the measure before Congress adjourns in early October.

"Representatives have to make sacrifices of their own before they ask anyone else to do without. For more than a decade, both parties have buried this country deeper and deeper in debt. Naturally, the American people now do not trust Congress to set the right priorities," Kirkpatrick wrote in the letter Thursday. "We need to prove that we are actually serious about restoring fiscal discipline -- serious enough to start the cutbacks with our own pocketbooks."

If the measure passes, it would mark the first congressional pay cut since April 1, 1933 during the height of the Great Depression. Members of the U.S. House of Representatives earn a base pay of $174,000 per year and Kirkpatrick's proposed pay cut would amount to $8,700 savings per representative each year. The bill also would cut the base salaries of members of the U.S. Senate.

Kirkpatrick says the measure is not a "silver bullet" to fix all of the country's economic woes, but rather, she says, it is a necessary first step to restore fiscal discipline to Washington. Members of Congress should make sacrifices of their own before they can credibly look their constituents in the eye and ask them to cut back, Kirkpatrick says.

"A recent poll showed that 75 percent of Americans across the country think Congress should take a pay cut," Kirkpatrick said. "I'm continuing to talk to my colleagues, got a few more sponsors on the bill this week, and so we'll continue to push it. It's still about jobs and getting people back to work, and after being in the district for six weeks, you know I realized it's still a struggle. It's still a struggle out there."

Since introducing the bill last March, Kirkpatrick has voluntarily returned five percent of her own base pay each month by writing a check for $870 to the Bureau of the Public Debt. If the measure passes, Kirkpatrick's office says it would save taxpayers about $4.7 million each year.

"This is an idea that came from the folks back home. I was out shoveling snow last December and my neighbors were getting pink-slipped, furloughed, laid off, and I said, 'You know, Congress should feel the same pain, the same pain that the American people are feeling right now,'" Kirkpatrick said. "We should cut our pay. It would be the first time in 77 years that Congress has cut its pay, so I think it's about time."