A time to make laws and a time to fundraise? On the relation between salaries and time use for state politicians

摘要

We study the relationship between the level of compensation and time use for US state legislators. Using survey data on time use, we show that higher salary is robustly associated with legislators spending more time on fundraising. In contrast, higher salary is also robustly associated with less time spent on legislative activities and has no clear relation to time spent on constituent services. The fundraising results are particularly strong for legislators who do not intend to run for higher office. Our results are consistent with an interpretation that higher salary raises the value of office, and politicians respond with more fundraising because increased fundraising raises the chance of getting re-elected more than does increased legislative activity. Back-of-the-envelope calculations suggest that a $30,000 increase in salary is associated with politicians annually devoting 13 more hours to fundraising and 18 fewer hours to legislative activity.