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Tea Party House Members Even Wealthier Than Other GOP Lawmakers
Their politics may differ. But both the Tea Party and the Occupy movement have laid claim to representing the interests of the middle class, whose economic frustrations helped spur the groups' establishment and growth.
So which side's congressional lawmakers come closest to embodying that wide swath of the U.S. population? Or, in Occupy terms, which side is closer to the 99 percent?
Neither the members of the House Tea Party Caucus nor those of the House Progressive Caucus -- whose views most closely align with the Occupy Wall Street movement -- are remotely middle class, according to an analysis by the Center for Responsive Politics of congressional personal financial disclosure forms covering 2010, the most recently available data.
The members of the House Tea Party Caucus are especially wealthy, the Center's research shows.
The median average net worth of a member of the House Tea Party Caucus was $1.8 million in 2010. (Financial disclosure forms require lawmakers to value their assets and liabilities only in ranges, so it's impossible to know exactly how wealthy a particular elected official is. However, it's possible to calculate an average net worth for each member of Congress.)
That's significantly higher than the comparable number for the median House member: $755,000. It's also more than 130 percent above the $774,280 average net worth of the median, non-Tea Party Caucus House Republican.
Furthermore, the caucus, a group of 60 House members founded by Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.), includes 33 millionaires and six members worth more than $20 million, according to the Center's research. That means a member of the group is more likely to be a millionaire than the average Republican who isn't in the caucus.
Christopher Arterton, a professor of political management at George Washington University, called the Republican lawmakers' personal wealth unsurprising.
“Because they have amassed personal wealth, or inherited it, they are much more likely to be attuned to business or investment as an issue and less friendly towards regulations,” Arterton told OpenSecrets Blog.
“Their own background leads them to lean ideologically in the direction of business interests and free market.”
The median House Republican, generally speaking, was worth significantly more than the median House Democrat last year: $834,250 versus $635,000.
“The Republican Party is known to be a party that has lots of connections to big business, business interests and the so-called job creators so these people do tend to be more wealthy,” Arterton noted. “So it’s not surprising to me that the Republican members are wealthier than Democratic ones.”
The wealth among the House Tea Party Caucus's membership ranges from Rep. Stephen Fincher's (R-Tenn.) estimated average net worth of negative $3.3 million to the $49.3 million of the richest member of the group, Rep. Kenny Marchant (R-Texas).
The congressional offices of several members of both caucuses were contacted by OpenSecrets Blog, but all declined to comment for this story.
Similarly, on the other side of the aisle, members of the House Progressive Caucus may have less first-hand familiarity than some of their fellow lawmakers with the economic pinch being felt by many in the nation. Those in the caucus are less wealthy than the average House member, according to the data for last year -- but actually slightly wealthier than the average Democrat.
The Center's research found that the median average net worth of a member of the Progressive Caucus was about $639,500 in 2010. That's 3.4 percent more than the average net worth of $618,500 of the median House Democrat who is not part of the Progressive Caucus.
The least wealthy member of the House Progressive Caucus is from Rep. Laura Richardson (D-Calif.), whose estimated average net worth puts her $383,500 in debt. At the other end of the spectrum is Rep. Jared Polis (D-Colo.), whose estimated average net worth clocks in at $143.2 million. In all, 24 of the 73 voting members of the caucus are millionaires.
The small number of Senate-side members of both these caucuses may actually be closer, financially speaking, to the 99 percent.
The Senate’s three Tea Party Caucus members are relatively poor compared to their peers.
Sens. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.), Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and Mike Lee (R-Utah) were, on average, each worth less than $774,000. That's well below the $2.6 million average for the Senate, and also well below the $3.2 million average for non-Tea Party Caucus GOP senators.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), the only senator in the Progressive Caucus, had an average net worth of $429,000 in 2010. That's about one-sixth the average net worth of the median member of the Senate Democratic caucus, which stands at $2.7 million.
Notably, Sanders, DeMint, Paul and Lee are all among the 25 poorest senators, according to the Center's research.
19 Comments so far
Show All"The members of the House Tea Party Caucus are especially wealthy ..."
A classic case of "I got mine, you can forget yours." Forget, that is, Social Security, Medicare as we know it, higher education and everything that makes for a more civilized society.
The tea party's wealth resulted in Obama pandering to the tea party (that will never vote for him) while he chastised the people who voted for him, any time they demanded the least bit of accountability.
Ray, what a bunch of shit!
Ditto, Ray.
So it's official the elected teaparty officials are not part of the 99% they are part of the 01%. No wonder their only defence against the 99% is "get a job" screams. They fail to understand most of us would love to, we just haven't been able to find any in our home towns or anywhere else in this nation. It's hard to find a job when HR departments won't even interview the unemployed. Only the 01% would find that acceptable, since most of them have never really had to seek work in their lifetimes.
http://jobsearch.about.com/b/2011/10/20/unemployed-need-not-apply.htm
The tea party DOES "understand most of us would love to have a job". The tea party does not care what "most of us would love". Working class people can not afford to purchase representation or justice.
In the US only the 1% and corporations can afford representation and justice.
Surprise, surprise.
The next time some ignorant Tea Bagger starts spouting off about their faux movement being a true expression of ordinary people's anger instead of an astro-turf political kabuki play funded by the likes of the Koch brothers; mention this and see them go through rhetorical gymnastics attempting to explain this away. If you're polite, you will stifle your derisive laughter.
Follow the yellow brick road.... The Wizard of Oz, Frank L. Baum and a fable about the history of money in the US by Bill Still. Fascinating documentation
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3VNcnxj2Dr8
The fact that some progressives are wealthy is not that big a deal. TR (who had enough of his own financial worrries but was still wealthy for the time,) FDR, and the Kennedys all stood up for the middle class. But the teagaggers are a very different animal - predators, and representatives of the most wealthy members of the society- AND bought and paid for by those interests.
Shame on Americans for being stupid enough to send these vicious things into "our" Congress.
Rand Paul must have a lot of money offshore. How can an ophthalmologist be only worth that much? Is he married with everything in his wife's name? The Ronster is a physician too, so he didn't exactly start from scratch, either, and I'm sure he didn't even go into debt for college.. And I'm still wondering how a guy gets into med school without graduating college first.. maybe it's nice to have a daddy in high places?
In the interest of trying to get Rocky Anderson's name and message out there, as I can't find much in the way of media exposure for him and the Justice Party
http://www.opednews.com/Podcast/Rocky-Anderson-Justice-Pa-by-Rob-Kall-120104-455.html
Looking beyond the title of the article, it’s also interesting to note that TP House Republicans are significantly wealthier than their non-TP House Republican counterparts. That can be viewed as a potential indication of the co-opting of the fledgling Tea Party movement by Dick Armey (former GOP House Majority Leader), FoxNews, and PAC groups like the Heritage Foundation funded by groups such as the US Chamber of Commerce and the Koch Brothers.
The original fledgling “deficit” Tea Party was successfully co-opted and redirected into backing “pro-plutocracy” candidates who subsequently voted to make tax breaks for the plutocracy a higher priority than cutting the deficit (the original fledgling Tea Party’s concern).
Wait a minute. Is this wealth or income? If the salary and extras of the average is 285,000 how is it possible that some of these people have a net worth of only 650k? This does not add up. I would like to know the yearly income of each member. They take in 285k and can make money from investments, rents and interest but their net worths are around a million. Anyone in CA that owns a house has a net worth of 300k! Then what about personal belongings and family income...something smells about this story.
The net worth contribution from a house is the current-day market value minus the outstanding principal on the loan. So I suspect that many or most Californians who own a house are "underwater" and the net worth from their house is a negative number.
How someone can with a median or even mean salary can afford a house in California (or other areas like New York or DC) is has always been a mystery to me. I couldn't afford to buy a detached house, and barely even a 1 br condo out in the suburban wastelands if I lived there.
But you are correct. It is hard to beleive that someone earning a senators or rep's salary for a few years could not be worth more than $650K even if they are just putting the money in their TSP (government employee thrift plan) fixed interest fund. Maybe they live extravigantly. I know that as my pay has increased, I blow it on a lot of stuff like dining out and hobbies - plus some charities and activist casues.
So what? Friedrich Engels was a relatively wealthy industrialist. What counts is not wealth but insight.
This comes as a surprise to anyone? To even begin a congressional campaign you have to be "the right sort" which means eather rich or very well thought of by those who are. Once in office one would have to be a total boob not to amass great personal wealth and this does not mean that you have to be a Tom Delay. The stock market is their pickle barrel. Knowledge of upcoming bills is a license to print money and acting on that inside information is legal for members of Congress and likely the Supreme Court as well.
The data presented are useful to understand the interests of these legislative elites, but it's too bad the author of the article doesn't have a clue about mathematical averages. He repeatedly uses phrases such as "the average net worth of the median member". It's either average (the mean) or median (the middle). You can't have an average of the median (a single person).
Being rich in the USA actually helps a person get elected. Please! Do get real. Showing this simply will help these jerks win. The brain washed citizenry still have this crazy notion that those who are rich are somehow better. Also millionaire is really just a poor person today. Billionaires and some others are the ones who have enough to be called truly rich. A net worth of less than eight or ten million dollars today isn't even in the ball park for being counted as wealthy. Do check what a person could do on that if that were all the individual had to live on and then had to live off the interest he or she could get from it.