[enjo]

Think of a startup whose founders spent 70% of their time raising money, they would never get anything done.

That's a bad example. For even a relatively early stage startup, raising money is the actual job description for a typical startup CEO. They probably spend more than 70% of their time on it.

It doesn't invalidate your point at all, however. Lawmakers are not startup CEO's. By providing every incentive to simply raise more money to ensure further employment, we've created just the worst possible system for functional government.

[AlwaysBCoding]

yeah like a five person team who's CEO spends 70% of time fundraising is probably fine. But an ENTIRE team that spends 70% of their time fundraising perpetually would be about as effective as Congress actually is.

[crdoconnor]

Congresspeople have staffers who do not fundraise.

[WildUtah]

"The MRA for each Representative is calculated based on three components, including personnel, which is the same for each Member ($944,671 for each Member in 2014)"

"Each Member may use the MRA to employ no more than 18 permanent employees, a level that has remained unchanged for nearly four decades. A Member may employ up to four additional [part-time] employees "[0]

So each congressman can hire 18 people for about a million dollars total, including both district and DC staff and not including himself. That's a good size startup. Congressmen who do spend a lot of time fundraising (not all of them -- hundreds in safe districts don't bother) are like the CEO of that office raising the money while staffers do the work at his direction.

[0]http://library.clerk.house.gov/reference-files/114_20150106_...