If MPs salaries were defined as a percentage of the median wage, would that change their behaviour?

[andrewducker]

Idle thought I had - and I haven't investigated it, so I have no idea if others have previously proposed this.

But by tying it specifically to the median, that means that (a) it would encourage policies that kept people's wages up and (b) they couldn't be accused of taking raises while the average person wasn't.

Edit: To be clear, as over on FB people seem to be misunderstanding this a lot, I'm not saying "Let's reduce their pay to less than the median wage." - MP pay is currently 250% of median wage,and that doesn't seem wholly unreasonable to me. I'm saying "Define it as 250% of median wage", what effect would that have?

Comments

[j_v_lynch]

why median and not minimum?

[andrewducker]

1) I'd like to base it on them improving things for the greatest number of people, not just one segment.
2) Minimum wage is something they have direct control over - I'd like them to improve _the economy_ such that wages in general improve, not just give themselves a pay raise by fiat.