I heard more news on NPR that irritated me. Today, it was about health care for children and what income level is appropriate to qualify for that. Apparently, I make 3.5 times what the poverty level is for a family of three. Me, a single female with a professional degree. That makes the poverty level somewhere around $18k, for a family of three. In the bay area, rent is at least $15k for a one bedroom apartment.

Anyway, that doesn't get to my point. My point was inspired by a Georgia representative who said that the high income requirements were 'greedy', this after we heard a tearful mother of two who makes $30k explain that $200 to $300 a month for private health insurance would mean cutting other expenses. Sher mentioned that 2-300 was the equivalent of two weeks of groceries, and asked her elected officials, those responsible for helping everyone, why she, who moved from a maid to the manager of a condomiunum as a single mother, had to make such choices.

It got me thinking - we have representatives, but they aren't representative. I suggest that we pay representatives only the median income of their district - that is take-home pay, not campaign money or anything else. We only cover their health, dental, etc costs at the level of what is covered for everyone in their distrct. If 60% of the people in their district have health coverage, they have 60% of their gross bills covered. I don't think this would be excessive at all. There are 435 federal representatives and about 100 per state. It would be pretty easy to assess each district and impose the restrictions on the representatives. I'd say one person would need to be employed each year per 100 reps. So 5 at the federal level, assessing district stats and giving reports to payroll.

Thoughts?