Why The US President need Salary?

The White House

Alright, so here’s the question: how much does the US President get paid? Seems easy enough, right? At first glance, you’d think this is one of those questions where I should be able to just tell you a number and then you can go on your merry way, exploring the rest of what the Internet has to offer: rap battles, trick basketball shots, people falling down staircases. But, of course, if things were really that simple, The truth is that the answer is… as usual…a little bit more complicated than you might first think.

Now, we’re going to get down to talking cold hard cash soon enough.But at first why does the President even need a salary? After all, don’t they get to live for free in a big White House with a fancy staff and a private plane and those cool M&Ms with the presidential seal on them? Well, yes…but also, no. See it turns out that despite what most people think, life in the White House isn’t totally free. While it is true that Presidents don’t have to pay rent or utilities in the White House, they do have to pay for almost everything else. 

Also Read: The US President for one day

One of the most significant costs is food—the White House has its own kitchen staff, but Presidents aren’t given some sort of win-270-electoral-votes-get-one-meal-free coupon. The cost of every meal that kitchen whip up for the First Family gets tallied and put into an itemized bill to be paid at the end of the month, and while the salary of the chef who makes that food is covered by the government.

Not all staff costs are—for example, when the President throws a private White House party, they have to pay not only for the food and beverages, but also for the wait staff, servers, cleanup crew, and anything else that would be at a White House party, like… I dunno… a piñata shaped like Congress.

Plus, the President has to pay for everything else that a normal person might need: toothpaste, shampoo—well, except for Eisenhower—those little American flag pins, a Netflix subscription, and, of course, clothes—which can also get quite expensive, especially for the First Lady, who is generally expected to wear different,expensive, designer outfits to a wide array of events, because, you know, sexism. 

Now, for official Presidential business, the federal government does pick up the tab, so the President isn’t stuck paying for things like state dinners, secret service, Air Force One, and so on, which often leads to controversy that we’re going to give a big wide berth and not address in the slightest.

For anything personal, though taxpayers aren't expected to cover the bill, which means that when JFK wanted a midnight snack—and I don't mean Marilyn Monroe, I mean, like, a sandwich or something—he had to pay out of his own pocket. Now that we’ve talked about why the President Needs money, let’s talk about the money itself. 

                         

The President’s salary is set by Congress,and Congress has voted to raise that salary six times, mostly just so that it keeps up with inflation. One interesting little wrinkle of this power is that under Article II, Section 1, Clause 7 of the Constitution, Congress cannot raise the President’s salary for the current term, only for future terms.

That is, if Congress votes to raise the President's Salary, that raise doesn’t take effect until after the next Presidential election. This provision is presumably in place to prevent corruption in the Oval Office, which so far has been working out great. 

The first ever US presidential salary went to, of course, the first ever US president—George Washington, who was paid $25,000 a year. Now that may not seem like a lot, but when you adjust for inflation, in 1789, when Washington took office, $25,000 was worth about $720,000 in 2019 dollars—at least, according to the CPI index, which is going to be what I use for all of these inflation calculations because even though I know there are bunch of different ways to calculate inflation, this is the one I like, and if you have a problem with that,you can leave an angry comment below. 

The President’s salary stayed at $25,000 until 1872, at which point, Congress raised the president’s salary to $50,000,starting with the second term of Ulysses S. Grant—In 2019 dollars, Grant was making about $1.1 million. That lasted until 1908, when the salary was upped to $75,000 starting in 1909, for the first term of William Howard Taft, giving him the highest inflation-adjusted salary of any President—nearly $2.2 million in 2019 dollars. 

In 1948, we saw another raise, which took place in the middle of Truman’s two terms. As of his second term, which started in 1949, he made $100,000, or just under $1.1 million in 2019 dollars. 

In 1968, Congress doubled it, which meant that starting in 1969, the President, now Richard M. Nixon, made $200,000, or about$1.4 million in 2019 dollars. That salary lasted all the way through the end of Bill Clinton’s second term in 2000, when it was doubled once more, to $400,000,or about $600,000 in 2019 dollars. 

And now in 2019, it still sits at $400,000,which in 2019 dollars would be $400,000. Now there are a few additions to that $400,000 salary—a $50,000 expense account, a $100,000 non taxable travel account, and a $19,000 entertainment account. Plus, when the President moves in, they get$100,000 to redecorate the White House however they’d like, but apart from that, and the private jet, and the private helicopter, and the secret service, and the millions they'll make giving talks once they leave office, they don’t get anything else—being president truly is a hard knock life.