February 18, 2016

I am personally responsible for helping overpay socialists to make Colorado unaffordable, overregulated and one windstorm away from a power blackout. I failed you.

Colorado legislators already get automatic inflation raises. You know, just like your job (I’m assuming the sarcasm bled through that one).

No private-sector worker has that kind of protection forever. Even union jobs eventually meet reality. Ask Spirit Airlines employees.

And that’s the problem.

What happens when lawmakers no longer depend on the private sector for most of their livelihood? They stop understanding the people they supposedly represent. They get disconnected.

And has Colorado ever had more of a disconnected team of politicians?

Part-timers

It wasn’t that long ago legislators made around $17,000 for their 120 days of meddling under the Gold Dome. The idea was simple: take a few months away from your regular job to represent your community.

Back then, lawmakers lived in the same economy as the rest of us because they worked in it.

Today legislators make more than $50,000 for their 120-day session, plus a hefty per diem ranging from $99 to $193 a day. That means many are pulling in at least $500 a day to pass laws making Colorado steadily less affordable.

But can you really put a price on outlawing ketchup packets after giving illegal immigrants Medicaid during a budget crisis?

And when legislators say they work year-round, understand the translation. They call it citizen “engagement.” The rest of us call it campaigning. Paying them our tax dollars to do so is the ultimate pro-incumbent scam.

Naturally, all people want more money. Politicians are no different. They just have more power than you do.

Now, they couldn’t just openly vote themselves a raise. That looks bad. Elections, optics — all that nonsense. Also, that would be direct, transparent and honest. They wouldn’t know how to do it.

The commission

So they did what politicians always do when they want a predetermined outcome without their fingerprints. They created a commission.

I know. I served on it. The then House minority leader is a friend and pressured me to be on it. Then she quit the legislature to save her own sanity (I’ll get even with you, Rose Pugliese! Payback is a b****, lady).

The Independent State Elected Official Compensation Commission — how Soviet sounding can you get? Along with the Senate minority appointee, we were basically the only two members who thought maybe performance should factor into compensation.

Tiny detail: the commission was supposedly making “recommendations.” Except they really weren’t recommendations at all.

Recommendations are given to people who later decide how to act on something. But the law creating our little salary-washing operation was designed so if the legislature did absolutely nothing, our “recommendations” automatically became law.

That’s the game — no “action” required.

Create a commission. Fill it with people who will give you what you want; in this case to recommend raises. Structure the law so lawmakers don’t have to vote for the raises. Then let “taking no action” become the action.

If you’re getting flashbacks to “The Sting,” that’s understandable.

My idea was we recommend the legislature cut their legislative session from 120 days to 90 days, but keep their salary the same. That would be a huge raise per day worked and free up another month a year to make money in the real, like their constituents.

Lots of states have 90-day sessions or less, and some, like Texas, have 90-day every other year.

The commission dismissed my idea.

Another member proposed tying some portion of compensation to state performance. Not exactly commission sales, but at least some accountability for affordability, economic growth, or fiscal stability. Not quite working on commission, but definitely a bonus structure.

That idea didn’t fly either.

Back-door pay raise

Instead, the commission embraced government’s oldest salary justification: “Other governments are doing it.”

So beyond their automatic inflation increases, legislators now get another 6% raise they never had to publicly approve.

The next governor gets an 11% bump.

The state treasurer gets 28% more.

And the attorney general gets a staggering 45% increase.

While we sit in a budget shortfall of their own “hey let’s put everyone including illegals on Medicaid” making, they get rewarded for it. So if you were giving them your annual employee review based on performance, would they get this raise?

Jon Caldara is president of Independence Institute, a free market think tank in Denver.