Manchin has made it clear he will happily (and literally) burn the entire planet down for $5M/year.

If lobbying is legal, than bribes should be too.

I'd chip into the "Pay Manchin a ransom of $50M to not do $50T of damage to the planet" fund.

Suppose you did pay each legislator $50M to work for the good of the whole country. Do you think this would prevent Manchin from being influenced by a $5M lagniappe? It's an extra 10%! And a certain well-known politician infamously took care to fleece the secret service for overpriced golf cart and hotel room rentals, despite getting hundreds of millions per year in emoluments revenues. Some people are really motivated by every penny despite what economists might tell you about marginal utility.

Who's version of whats good?

> If lobbying is legal, than bribes should be too.

Also selling your vote. Then we can at least choose the pol who sends the biggest check.

Another commenter here claimed that in Singapore, they pay 3x the national median salary. Singapore is not my cup of tea government-wise, but they are viewed as one of the least corrupt governments in the world.

Certainly that's not solely due to how they are paid, but I'm sure it factors in.

Median salary in the US is 67k.

3 of that is a rounding error from what our reps are currently paid.

Not sure what that argument is going?

> Median salary in the US is 67k.

No, it's not. Median household income is about $67k. Median salary (or, at least “median annual earnings for workers who worked full time”) is about $56k.

Ok, does not change my post in any way.

> Do countries with less corrupt lawmakers pay more than the US? I doubt that...

This assumes ones level of corruption has to do with income. Is that true or are there other factors?