Pennsylvania’s gravy train

Pennsylvania’s gravy train

The average pay for a state leg- islator in the United States is about $34,000.

So one might think that Pennsylvania’s lawmakers, who were making $79,623 and have a package of perks second to none, would have been embarrassed to take a raise at a time when the state was slashing costs almost everywhere outside the capital. And one would be wrong.

Effective Dec. 1, members of the Legislature will see their $79,623 salary jump to $82,026. The four lucky legislative leaders will see their pay go from $115,364 to $118,845 per year.

The same budget that legislators passed in July cutting allocations to education and virtually every state department let stand the automatic cost-of-living adjustments legislators have been receiving since 1995. Unless the Legislature as a whole votes not to accept the raises, which were calculated at 3 percent this year, all 253 members of the House and Senate get them. About 20 percent of the members have written checks to charity or to the state as a way of declining their raises, but even then the higher payments are used to calculate their pensions. And, oh, what pensions they are.

Million-dollar deal

Legislators can retire at 50 or 55, depending on when they were elected, while other state employees can retire at 60 or 65, depending on when they were hired. An analysis by USA Today showed that a legislator was likely to collect about $1 million during his or her retirement, twice that of the average state employee.

Legislators who live more than 50 miles from Harrisburg also receive $163 per day when the Legislature is in session for food and lodging, no receipts required. And they all get a car allowance and family medical coverage that can cost as much as $20,000 a year for House members and $30,000 for senators.

Pennsylvania’s legislators are second in pay only to California’s, where that state’s 40 senators and 80 assemblymen receive $95,000 a year. But Pennsylvania’s 253 legislators serve about 12.7 million residents, while California’s 120 serve 37 million. Which means Pennsylvanians pay about five times per capita more for representation. Are they getting their money’s worth?