Median senator age is 62. Most Senators are highly educated (many from highly-paid professions such as legal before they became highly-paid senators) and married.
Thirty years of high income (100-150K family income in today's dollars) with 10-15% saving and investing in the market can easily result in a net worth in the low millions, not including inherited investments, long-term real estate property appreciation, etc. People in their 60s have seen an incredible appreciation over the past 30 years in most sectors (Just the S&P Index itself is over 9% annualized over that time frame).
Long story, short, $2.5M is not by any means exorbitant for retirement age people with an educated and successful life.
It would be a bizarro world where we would want idiot paupers to be Senators, or even a socio-economically equivalent demographic.
I think most government workers, elected or not, would find the idea that you work in government for the money amusing to say the least.
I think the only way to address this concern is to have a net-worth pre-public servant and a report showcasing annually going forward. I fully understand that success is not tied to any one or individual facet of life in general - however being highly educated has no bearing on being highly moral or even fundamentally believing you're actually serving the greater good of the people. It may mean you have an indelible way of speaking a good speech or understanding the game of chess that it seems our government is playing against the masses.
I'd like to think that all Senators have their caucus at heart, but I've lost a lot of faith in these sort of people over the years. When they reel on simple questions around these topics it doesn't help.
Thirty years of high income (100-150K family income in today's dollars) with 10-15% saving and investing in the market can easily result in a net worth in the low millions, not including inherited investments, long-term real estate property appreciation, etc. People in their 60s have seen an incredible appreciation over the past 30 years in most sectors (Just the S&P Index itself is over 9% annualized over that time frame).
Long story, short, $2.5M is not by any means exorbitant for retirement age people with an educated and successful life.
It would be a bizarro world where we would want idiot paupers to be Senators, or even a socio-economically equivalent demographic.
I think most government workers, elected or not, would find the idea that you work in government for the money amusing to say the least.