Way back in 1789, being a member of Congress in a fledgling United States was a big deal. It was a duty filled with responsibilities that had lasting effects to this day. You might expect that such an important job would come with an impressive salary, but actually the only thing impressive about it is how small it is: a mere fifty cents a day!

It is true that back then, fifty cents a day would last you a whole lot longer than it would today, but even when adjusting for inflation the yearly salary for a member of Congress was still only about $5,000 a year in today’s dollars. The figure jumped in in 1795 to a whole dollar a day, and by 1815, salaries were up to almost $20,000 a year in 2019 dollars for members of Congress. But that still is only a fraction compared to what they make now, and even back then was not enough to support a family on. So why exactly were the salaries so low, and when did the position start being so lucrative?

Well the theory at the time was that being a member of Congress back then was considered a civic duty. People didn’t do it for the money, which was hardly enough to cover travel expenses, accommodation, etc. Simply put, people worked in Congress not for the money, but to serve their country.

This might indeed sound like a good idea, but being in Congress is a little bit more demanding than your typical local volunteering opportunities. The traveling expenses, compared to the low pay, basically guaranteed that Congress was staffed only by people who were wealthy enough to be able to be paid so little. Basically, you had to be rich to be in Congress.

Today, the opposite is true, and it’s possible to actually make a small fortune in Congress, with the average first year salary being somewhere around $175,000. Although with campaigning and travel costs, the job still might be the providence of the rich. To this day there is a philosophical debate surrounding how much or how little members of Congress should be paid. But whether or not they are paid too much, it’s still surprising to know how little they were paid in the beginning, and how that lead to unintended consequences.