Congressional Salaries
The Ethics Reform Act of 1989 provided for an automatic annual pay increase for Members of Congress based on a Bureau of Labor Statistics formula for calculating raises in the private sector — unless Members voted to deny themselves the extra money. Since then, lawmakers have blocked their pay raises 11 times, including every year since the recession started in 2009. Senators, representatives, and delegates currently receive $174,000 a year; the speaker of the House, majority leaders of the House and Senate, and president pro-tempore of the Senate make more. Since 2001, the salary of the President of the United…
