[toyg]

> How do we know it's not money in a brown paper bag/briefcase

One of the problems is that some of these checks can only be performed much later.

The most common currency of choice, for modern bribes, is the promise of a fat gig in the private sector when the political career ends. As the public demands younger and younger political classes, with lower and lower salaries, while maintaining an appetite for career-ending scandals and relatively short terms in office, it's inevitable that individuals will tend towards ensuring their future survival. Such promises need no paper trail, are trivial to keep, and are effectively invisible for years. When they're realized, it's typically too late to do anything about the original source of corruption, and the new guys in power have no incentive to cut that income source for them; in fact, they now know it works and are more likely to tap it for themselves.

[Sebb767]

> As the public demands younger and younger political classes, with lower and lower salaries

Looking into the US senate, I fail to see that trend. In the last presidential election, both candidates were older than my grandparents.

Even in my country, seeing a really young person in a political position is very rare. They exist (if you define "young" as under 40), but they are rare. I don't think age worries are a factor at all.

[mbg721]

In the US there's a huge disconnect between national and local political positions; the national politicians are largely 80 years old and have enough muscle from their party structure and the media to be essentially scandal-proof. The voters don't like that but can't really fix it; local politicians, who are younger, see the big-time corruption in Washington and assume that's how things get done, and all of a sudden you have things like a majority of Cincinnati city council being investigated by the FBI.

[Bud]

You're not paying attention to the salaries part, though.

Look at the pay for members of the House and Senate, in real dollars, over the last 50 years. Also pay attention to how much stupid noise there is about how members of Congress are supposedly overpaid. The pay for all US Senators combined (under $18M) is less than half of what LeBron James makes (over $41M) in salary alone in a year.

[b3morales]

That's not a very informative comparison. LeBron James is a outlier's outlier in a sector that already has exceptional pay. Senators' salaries would more usefully be compared to the (upper) middle-class white-collar workforce that they would most likely occupy if they weren't in office.

[hiptobecubic]

I don't see how you can compare being a senator to being a middle manager at some bank. The problem is that the banker faces huge consequences if they do something stupid to earn a little money by abusing their position and the upside isn't even that big. By comparison, senators have the opportunity to earn literally millions by doing things that aren't even technically illegal, like being given a wink-and-nod promise of a revolving door-style highly paid position in industry, "insider" trading that for some reason just doesn't count, etc.

[b3morales]

The parent comment was talking about Congressional salaries, not all potential income.

[spc476]

But until relatively recently (2018 perhaps?) Congress was legally allowed to profit with insider trading (probably due to Article I, section 6, paragraph 1 of the Constitution).

[Bud]

Sure. My point is that we should pay Congress more so that they have less incentive for wrongdoing of various kinds.

[toyg]

My outlook is European. In the US the political career is indeed longer, because there are effectively more levels (EU Parliament and Commission are still largely considered a step down from national-level politics, silly as it might sound). But the selectiveness (only two senators per state, often lasting decades) makes it similarly treacherous at the mid-level.

> They exist (if you define "young" as under 40)

In political terms, at the (European) national level, "young" is typically under 50, and "old" is over 70. Acquiring reputation and solid power base takes time.

Looking at the UK: Tony Blair was considered very young when he became PM at 44; Thatcher was 53, Major 57, Brown 56, and most of their predecessors were much older. Cameron was 43 but again May was 59 and Johnson 55. Backbenchers will typically enter Parliament around 35-40.

In Italy you can basically add 10 to all those numbers; the current PM (or PdCM, for the purists) is 73.

[fisherjeff]

Senators are old but many of their staffers are young, underpaid, and, through their job, well-connected to industry. Perfect recipe for a revolving door.

[truffdog]

Their staff- who do the research and write the laws- are almost entirely under 30 though.