Elizabeth Warren: “We Are Not Resting Until at Least 50 Senators Are [Millionaire] Women”
April 29, 2014
I’m not sure why she thinks that would solve her biggest beef, which is, in her words:
“Let’s just be real clear – the game is rigged and it’s rigged in favor of those who have money and who have power.”
If she was talking about the game she’s currently playing—the U.S. Senate—she couldn’t have spoken truer words.
In fact, 2014 marks a new record for Congress: For the first time in history, most members of Congress are millionaires, and the median net worth for all Senators increased by 10.8% over the prior year, to $2.7 million from $2.5 million.
According to a new analysis of personal financial disclosure data by the Center for Responsive Politics:
Of 534 current members of Congress, at least 268 had an average net worth of $1 million or more in 2012, according to disclosures filed last year by all members of Congress and candidates. The median net worth for the 530 current lawmakers who were in Congress as of the May filing deadline was $1,008,767 …
Breaking the numbers down further, congressional Democrats had a median net worth of $1.04 million, while congressional Republicans had a median net worth of almost exactly $1 million. In both cases, the figures are up from last year, when the numbers were $990,000 and $907,000, respectively.
Median incomes for Democratic Senators dropped a bit, due primarily to John Kerry’s leaving to become Secretary of State, removing his 2011 average net worth of $248 million from the pool, but remain in the very comfortable neighborhood of $1.7 million.
So the next time one of your “representatives” in Washington tells you she feels your pain, ask her to put her money where her mouth is.
