Apparently the PA state legislature is listening to its constituents. Kind of.
After months of angry talk show hosts and voters expressing their, well, anger with the pay raise the PA legislature gave themselves over the summer, both houses have passed bills to repeal it. It ain’t over yet, but it’s a step.
Here are the relevant stats (in my opinion):
Pre-raise, the base pay for a legislator was $69,647; top leaders made $108,722.
Post-raise base pay was $81,050; top leaders made $145,533.
According to the Patriot, the raises made PA legislators the second best paid in the nation.
But wait, you might be thinking, how can they give themselves immediate raises mid-term?
The raises weren’t in the form of actual raises because, you’re right, that would be illegal. Instead, they authorized monthly “unvouchered expenses.” That is, every month a legislator can say, “I spent a bunch of money, you need to reimburse me,” but doesn’t have to provide any kind of proof of that. It’s understood that they don’t actually have to spend any money.
So whether or not the PA legislators deserve raises, this was not a cool way to go about giving them to themselves.