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Comment by ngcc_hk | Hacker News Reader

The basic pay of Uk politicians are not that high.

The base pay of UK politicians is well above median salary and puts them into the top 5% of earners in the country; before you get into things like the fact that housing costs for two homes, travel and food costs are all fully subsidised.

Yet the significant majority of them can earn much more.

"Isn't that high" is not with reference to the median, but with reference to their pre-existing career prospects.

The salary of MPs is not sufficient, by a long way, to attract almost any one from other competing careers.

The fact that you could have a more highly paid job elsewhere does not excuse you from the responsibility to do your current job.

No of course not, what it means is that people with the skills to do the job properly and who care about their responsibilities are looking elsewhere, and only those who feel drawn to power and those who can’t get better jobs are left.

(I don’t have a solution, every option I’ve heard comes with downsides)

The basic salary for a UK MP is £81,932, with additional pay for additional responsibilities (such as being a minister).

The median UK salary is around £30,000.

For comparison- the MP's salary is similar to that of a military OF-4 (Commander, Lieutenant-Colonel or Wing Commander), a secondary school headteacher, or an NHS consultant (specialist doctor with at least 8-10 years experience post qualification).

And this means... what exactly? That we should expect MPs to perform their duties with the same diligence that we expect from military commanders, teachers and specialist doctors? Or that military commanders, teachers and specialist doctors should make rash uninformed decisions because they are underpaid?

But military officers, school officials and senior doctors don't generally have to spend thousands of their own money applying for a job, with no guarantee of success, and they don't typically get to take a five- or ten-year year career break and then just stroll back into their old career again afterwards.

MPs who become part of the government often do fairly well out of it, obviously more so the more senior the government position(s) they hold, and there are a lot more members of the government than most people realise. But rank and file MPs often get a pretty raw deal compared to the kinds of alternative options anyone with the attributes to be a good MP would probably have.

There is no educational or qualification or experience requirement to stand for election as a UK MP, all you need is a few hundred quid, the approval of your party and ten voters.

https://5050parliament.co.uk/get-elected/

Maybe we'd be better off if MPs had to study and practise as much as an NHS consultant has to before they can run the country?

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