The call has come from some quarters for the Michigan legislature to become a part-time job…not an end in itself. I tend to agree with those who would like to see a legislature that performs its duties and then goes home to their normal work. If we compare the salary of our legislators and the population of Michigan to the other states, our politicians are over-paid and under-worked. With expenses, a legislator draws about $91,000 a year. On top of this is the cost of keeping the capitol building functioning, to include its staff and the normal expenses of a bureaucracy.

The savings of having a part-time legislator are significant in terms of our daily lives and costs, but insignificant when looking at the total Michigan budget. However, going to a part-time legislature for no more reason than cost savings is not rational. What is reasonable is going to a legislature that is less than full-time because of the mind set. Legislators that don’t receive the time or money to be in Lansing full-time allows for a political body that focuses on the task at hand and doesn’t spend time on political pandering or proposing bills that are nonsensical.

I do believe that going to a part-time legislator should also allow a politician to have special rules in place in order to allow a legislator to retain his civilian employment while serving in Lansing. It should be similar to reserve military members who retain certain rights for those times when they are on active duty. Those rights could allow a part-time legislator to retain his position, title, pension and health benefits in his regular employment even though he may be at his “normal” job perhaps only ½ of the time. These rules would permit those who are not independently wealthy, business owners or masters of their normal work week to represent their home district without concern to losing their job that they have to return to some day. Perhaps this would truly allow the citizen-politician to represent those that are truly like him in terms of concerns, beliefs and desires for the state.