To the Editor:
I must take particular umbrage at James L. Baker's letter to the editor of the Shoshone News-Press published on 24 March of this year, in which he inveighs against the rising cost of necessities and the diminishing returns from his social security account.
How parochial!
Does not Mr. Baker consider the sacrifices of our Elected Leaders, who set the social security pay rate, along with regulating everything from the costs of car insurance to electricity? (They'll get around to setting the price of firewood, so this writer is told, as soon as the timber conglomerates can calculate a sufficiently lucrative mark-up and present a bill to Congress.)
Our beloved Members of Congress have sacrificed far greatly than you, Mr. Baker. They haven't had a raise since 2009! They receive their base pay of $174,000 per year along with free hair-cuts and pedicures, medical care, and travel in the front cabin of the airline of their choice, unless they are in Leadership, whereupon they get their own airplanes. And they haven't gotten a pay raise since – except for the 1 percent they just got and the extra $2,800 a year ($233 a month) they will get commencing in 2017.
I would love a $233 per month boost in my social security, Mr. Baker, just as much as you. However, our pay is frozen as are theoretically the salaries to Congressmen. But as long as our Congressmen are suffering free haircuts and free full-coverage medical care, and one million dollars' salary every seven years, I am happy to endure the sacrifice the rest of us must make on their behalf.