Find the Problem
I read the following on Facebook this morning and couldn’t let the facts be ignored.
Salary of the US President - $400,000. Salary of retired US Presidents - $180,000. Salary of House/Senate - $174, 000. Salary of Speaker of the House - $223,500. Salary of Majority/Minority Leaders - $193,400. Average Salary of Soldier DEPLOYED IN IRAQ - $38,000. I think we found where the cuts should be made!
I could care less about the subject; I have a problem with a strong emotional response to numbers that haven’t been thought about enough. You could insert government programs for the debt problem and I still would feel compelled to crunch numbers if I thought the concern was misplaced.
I see the same behavior at work. People need to focus on the problems instead of the first talking point they hear. Dig deep and ask yourself a question or two.
My reply is below.
I don’t disagree in your point but comparing the salary of hundreds of politicians to thousands of soldiers isn’t as much money as you may think.
The 543 politicians pull 94.8 million by your figures. The total number of soldiers in Iraq isn’t a number I was able to find so I choose the low ball estimate of troops during the 06-07 height, 130,000 (http://wapo.st/b0gr2e). If you give all the politicians a 38k salary and spread the difference to the 130k solider’s then each would get an additional $570 that year.
