Nice Work ... If You Can Find It !

How many hours of work a week do you put in...40, 50 or more? If you own a business it's probably not uncommon for you to work 12 or more hours a day, skip a lot of lunches and miss a lot of family events because of time on the job during weekends. If you're a homemaker, you probably work even longer hours.

Now how much time do you think Congress puts in for a full year for $174,000 in pay, not including perqs and benefits - which by the way includes an automatic $4700 pay increase that went into effect in January?

This year Congress is scheduled to work a total of 137 days - for everyone else a normal work year on the job is about 103 days longer or about 240 days.

The rebuttal, of course, is that members of Congress want you to know that they spend the rest of their time in their home districts working very hard - to get re-elected, that is.

Given the magnitude of the economic crisis confronting all of us, the limited number of days Congress actually spends on the job, and as precious as their time is, they apparently found enough of it to grind out that very vital piece of the people's business by legislating March 14th into officialdom as "PI Day" thereby promoting science and mathematics. It must have been a moment of tremendous satisfaction and personal pride, since clearly, quality efforts like this by Congress go a long way in assuring America's technical and scientific pre-eminence in the World.

Representative John Murtha, Democratic septuagenarian, said he thought they were voting for "Pie" Day - those of the fruit persuasion.

Apparently, my 6 year old grandaughter reads as much of the bills pending before Congress as our legislators do - though she comprehends more.

Ed Rendel, the Governor of Pennsylvania has something to say about Congress' work ethic - "How hard do you think Congress works?", he asks. "Until you can show me that you bust your hump every single day of the week—that you're working 10 hours a day, five days a week, and you have meetings on Saturdays—until you tell me that, don't tell me you're working too hard."

Personally, I'd rather see Congress not work at all, or at the very least not increase their hours ... for when they're on the job - it costs all of us a fortune.

Congress - please go away but more importantly, stay away!