How Can We NOT Afford Thousands of Representatives?

A common first reaction of a person learning of the Representation Amendment is, “How can we afford all those representatives?” My response is, “How can we not afford thousands of representatives?”

Congress spent more than three trillion dollars ($3,000,000,000,000) since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic over and above the annual budget. The spending will likely continue, as debate rages even now over the Build Back Better Act. The final cost of the Build Back Better Act looks to be between one and a half trillion dollars ($1,500,000,000,000) and three and a half trillion dollars ($3,500,000,000,000). Congress is spending incomprehensible sums of money in your name.

Getting back to the original premise of this discussion, how do we afford thousands of representatives, each with a staff and an office? Let’s review the cost of a single representative, as proposed in the book, The Representation Amendment (Because we don’t have enough people in Congress and the people already there are the wrong ones).

One representative - Pay should be about that of a senior GS12, with locality adjustments.
X staff members - The number of staff members per representative should be set by members of Congress in legislation.
Secure digital communications - Install into each district office a standard communications service capable of providing encrypted digital conferencing and networking.

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Yes, the government pays thousands of new employees to manage the offices of House members. If the cost to rent, staff, and furnish thousands of offices were added on top of current spending, then, yes, the cost for the Representation Amendment might be seen as excessive. But will the cost to implement the Representation Amendment come on top of the current spending, or in place of it? Federal spending originates in the House of Representatives, because the people tax themselves. The “Legacy House” is negotiating the details of a bill that brings their non-budget spending close to five or six trillion dollars over the past couple years. Huge sums of money members of Congress spent in those bills went to projects unrelated to COVID-19. If the “Representation House” spent one trillion dollars less, a “mere” three or four trillion dollars, the difference funds the entire Representation Congress for many years. So, would the “Representation House” spend less than the “Legacy House”? Or more? The “Legacy House” crafts a single bill and all members scramble to influence the text of that one bill. Representatives inject into the legislation text favorable to themselves, their constituents, or their preferred lobbyists and attempt to remove text displeasing to them. The majority party, if enough members are in agreement, get anything they want, because the legislation passes on a majority vote. Members of the minority party often have opportunities to insert text that help them, because the majority party gets brownie points with the American public if their legislation can be said to be bipartisan. Legislation produced by Congress today can be thought of as “additive”. Everybody wants to “add” new spending, regulations, or government agencies. Spending bills grow in size as each representative adds to the document. Nothing causes a spending bill to “collapse under its own weight,” to use a common phrase. There are no caps on spending in the system we have with the “Legacy Congress”. The “Representation Congress” remakes the playing field, especially where spending is concerned. Congress as structured by the Representation Amendment will find passing multi-trillion-dollar spending bills to be much more difficult, for a variety of reasons.

State ambassadors must approve spending proposed by the House

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Senators in the “Legacy Senate” are directly elected by popular vote of the people of their states. While members of the Senate cannot initiate spending, they participate in the spending through reconciliation of bills between the chambers of Congress. Senators need to satisfy voter blocks and lobbyists if they want to be re-elected. Reducing spending is not, therefore, any greater a priority for the Senate than for the House. Senators in the “Representation Senate” act as ambassadors from their home states. Their priorities differ from their colleagues in the House.

Being an ambassador for a state does not automatically mean any particular senator will respond to a three point five trillion dollar spending bill with, “Whoa, now, let’s think this through!”. Nothing prevents the representatives of the states from trying to get some goodies for their constituents. However, since senators represent states being affected by the programs and regulations funded by those three point five trillion dollars, some states might attempt to block that spending.

Any representative may propose an alternative bill

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In the book, The Representation Amendment, I point out the existing House rules for crafting legislation cannot scale into a functioning system for the “Representation House.” Not with thousands of House members. I propose a new system, a system based upon crowdsourcing techniques used by websites to allow thousands of people to come to a consensus.

A bedrock component of the “Representation House” as I propose it is this, that any representative may submit any bill at any time. If a representative submitted the 2500+ page Build Back Better Act, which includes trillions of dollars of spending, any other representative could copy the text of the bill, delete a few paragraphs, add a few paragraphs, and submit the altered document as their own. Now, members of the House have two versions from which to choose. And as more and more representatives slice and dice the text of the Build Back Better Act, the original content of the bill becomes a distant memory.

Eventually, members of the “Representation House” will tire of making changes to the text. One version will gain in favor, eventually becoming popular enough to get a vote on the floor of the House. If the bill gets majority approval, it is sent to the Senate for reconciliation.

Unlike bills crafted in the “Legacy House”, the “Representation House” bill-writing process should be incredibly dynamic. Anybody can revise any proposal. If a representative submits a superior idea for financially supporting people who cannot work due to COVID-19 restrictions, more and more copies of that legislation will include that idea. Even that idea will be improved, until eventually that idea goes to the Senate in a complete bill for reconciliation.

House members' neighbors' voices are louder than lobbyists' voices

Each House member works in an office located within their own district. The people who staff their office live in or near their district. Their constituents can visit the office any time the office is open and cross paths with their representative at local events and businesses. Districts consist of a mere 30,000 people, so all politics truly are local. “Representation House” congresspeople are far more tightly integrated into their districts than are representatives in the “Legacy House.”

Lobbyists must travel to each district to meet face-to-face with representatives or they can host a regional event. Lobbyists can make their case via audio and digital communications of course, but nothing is as effective as an in-person meeting. The diminished influence of lobbyists should directly translate into less federal spending.

No political party controls spending

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The two dominant political parties may never again hold the majority in the “Representation House”. With many thousands of people elected in districts having a population no larger than 30,000 people, party affiliation becomes less of a factor when people select a candidate. Political parties have agendas not always in alignment with the American people and often even their own members. Powerful people who work within the party wish to keep that power, which may also work against the wishes of the American people.

In the “Representation House”, where most House members may be members of a political party but are not beholden to that party for their seat, people vote as individuals. Political party leaders regularly strong-arm party members to vote for legislation the member may fine repugnant. In effect, your representative in the House is thus representing the party, not the district. So, in the absence of a political party having the majority of votes in the House, the spending level will decrease.

Permanent solutions will come from districts ignored by Congress today

Some people who fill seats in the “Representation House” come from the poorest of all districts. No “Legacy Congress” legislation ever seems to solve the problems faced by people living in these districts. Following ratification of the Representation Amendment, one person in every 30,000 residents of these districts will be a voice in Congress, with full access to the legislative process. Representatives of these districts will be able to join together as a force, to negotiate legislation with representatives of districts less depressed, to seek a permanent solution to their distress.

People who seek permanent solutions will replace people who seek re-election or party victories. American has an opportunity to experiment, to find permanent, mutually satisfactory solutions to many problems the Congress of today seems unable or unwilling to fix.

The American people love to help our own. With thousands of representatives proposing legislation to fix long-term problems such as those experienced by people living in the poorest of districts, the nation will need to spend less each year solving those problems. Because those problems will no longer be problems.

The Representation Amendment will more than pay for itself

The “Legacy Congress” is the perfect spending machine. I think the Congress as structured by the Representation Amendment, with House rules implemented according to the recommendations in the book, will spend far less money than the existing Congress. The savings will more than cover the cost of staffing thousands of offices nationwide.

Moreover, I think the American people will get what they really want from their representatives in the form of regulations and national policy. The legislation the “Representative Congress” sends to the president for a signature will be exactly what the American people and the states they call home want in their laws.

Caveat

If, following ratification of the Representation Amendment, the American people truly do want the House to pass several multi-trillion dollar spending bills each year, the American people will get that spending. This may sound odd, but this, too, is a success of the Representation Amendment. Americans, fairly represented in groups smaller than 30,000, elected representatives clearly instructed to spend more money.

The “Legacy House” spending trillions of dollars could be seen as the American people getting ripped off by influential people and groups and industries. The “Representation House” spending trillions of dollars is without a doubt the express will of the American people.

Conclusion

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With a mere 435 House members, Congress is on course to spend approximately six trillion dollars, using COVID-19 as its justification. For the most part, the regular budget of the United States federal government stands apart and on top of that six trillion dollars. Congress spends more than four trillion dollars every year, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

With the “Legacy Congress” spending four trillion dollars every year, and then spending five or six trillion more for a national emergency, I again ask, “How could we NOT afford the thousands of representatives we get with the Representation Amendment?“

I think the American people can get everything they want for a lot less than four trillion dollars every year. I think a lot of organizations and businesses who have become accustomed to easy government money will be disappointed. Sorry, not sorry.

With the Representation Amendment, the American people get what they want. I firmly believe the American people would not spend the sums we have seen Congress spend in the last two years. I also believe any money spent would be more targeted, would be better tracked, and would be more effective. But most importantly, since that spending was authorized by a majority of representatives elected from tiny districts distributed across the nation, and that spending was approved by a majority of states’ ambassadors, I know that spending happened with the blessing of the American people, and I have no cause to be upset if I disapprove.