While His Constituents Get Pay Cuts, Jim Gerlach takes Pay Raises Again and Again and Again

Manan Trivedi Highlights Contrast Between His Congressional Pay Cut Plan and Gerlach’s Addiction to Pay Raises in Norristown and Reading Today

ELVERSON, Pa. – While average Americans are still feeling the pain of the worst recession since the Great Depression, and so many in the 6th Congressional District are having their pay cut, Congressman Jim Gerlach does not have to worry about his own financial situation. That’s because the congressman has been taking a series of pay raises during his time in office. Knowing that we need to begin to pay down the skyrocketing debt and that Washington is out of control and out of touch, Manan Trivedi has called for a congressional pay cut.

Today, at events in the Norristown and Reading areas, Trivedi sat down with people from the community, including some who have seen their pay cut or lost their job, to discuss the contrast between his plan to cut congressional pay and Gerlach’s history of happily taking pay raises.

Since 2002, Gerlach has taken a whopping five Congressional pay raises totaling $19,300 1.

“Jim Gerlach has lost his way with what’s going on back here in our community,” Trivedi said. “While the people he’s supposed to be representing are coming home with either slashed paychecks or pink slips, Jim Gerlach’s been coming home with a fatter wallet. It’s clear that Gerlach has adopted a Washington way of doing business, because only in Washington would someone think it’s okay to take money from taxpayers who are being hit with pay cuts to give yourself a pay raise.”

Trivedi says that the best way to bring Washington back in line and in touch with the rest of America is to cut their pay. As a congressman, Trivedi will not only cut his own pay, but he will fight for an across-the-board 5% pay cut for all Members of Congress.

“With so many in our district still unable to find a job or hold on to a reliable paycheck,” Trivedi said, “and with so many others having to tighten their belt to manage with fewer hours or lower pay, it’s wrong for people down in Washington to take payraises. It is their job to represent the needs of the people who elected them, and instead they are collecting a fat paycheck while not doing nearly enough to get this economy back on track. Between the towering unemployment and skyrocketing debt, there has never been a more important time to restore fiscal discipline in Washington, where out-of-control spending has become a way of life.”

This would be the first time Congress has cut their own salary in 77 years 2. Not only will Trivedi push for cutting his own pay and the pay of all members of Congress, but he will work to perpetuate this fiscal discipline by ending automatic pay raises for Congress.

Trivedi also discussed his plan to get the economy back on track and get the people of the 6th District back to work. By encouraging job growth in small businesses, clean tech manufacturing, and infrastructure investments, and by ending the tax breaks for corporations that ship our jobs overseas, Trivedi’s comprehensive jobs plan will bring jobs back to our community 3.

Manan Trivedi is the Democratic nominee for Congress in Pennsylvania’s 6th Congressional District. He is a primary care physician, a former Lt. Commander in the U.S. Navy, and an Iraq War veteran from Berks County.

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