Would an impeached president still receive benefits under the Former Presidents Act? What about a convicted one? What about one who resigns before conviction?
Step one is Impeachment in the House of Representatives.Step two is a Conviction of Impeachment in the Senate.Step three is removal from office.This has never happened. Nixon resigned before step two was completed. President Ford pardoned Nixon to avoid the continuing drama and Nixon retired to New Jersey in shame. It's my understanding that he passed on lifetime Secret Service protection in favor of his own private security. Paid with his “pension”.If a sitting President were Convicted and removed from office he would not necessarily get benefits. He would also very likely be facing the serious likelihood of criminal proceedings. If that were the case he would be “secured” by Secret Service personnel until the criminal procedure was completed.If this theoretical President remained free and unconvicted I imagine he would still benefit from a Protective Detail, in the interest of National Security. He would not get the retirement package though.If convicted of a Crime (s)he would be placed in a somewhat unique prison, in the interest of National Security.Presidents know things other people, even Senators, don't. That's a significant factor in the Presidential Protective details. Even a disgraced President warrants a certain degree of Protection. It would be, unfortunate, for an Ex-President to fall into the wrong hands.
What is the health care coverage like for members of congress, the senate, and other high ranking government employees?
They have great benefits mostly paid for by the taxpayers.About 70 percent of the insurance plan premiums are paid for by the taxpayer . Those government employees, unlike most people stuck with Obamacare, pay no tax on the premiums.Most of the small out-of-pocket costs for all medical care paid for by government employees is also paid for with “before tax” dollars. Again, unlike most citizens stuck with Obamacare.Government employees have LOT’s of choice, unlike most citizens stuck with Obamacare. Most Government employees have access to Preferred Provider Plans (PPO’s) that allow them to go out of the small network of doctors in most HMO’s if the employee chooses to pay more out of their own pocket.Citizens stuck with Obamacare have seen virtually all PPO options disappear over the last 3 years. Those citizens are stuck in ever smaller, ever narrowing networks but they can’t go ‘out of network” unless they pay ALL costs out of their own pocket.My dad was a Federal Civil service Government Employee from the time he left WWII to the time he retired in 1979. I helped him and my mom make his choices at open enrollment time for 20 years. Compared to what I was selling to individuals and private companies the benefits were ALWAYS far superior.They still are.
Cons if you could implement only one reform in to legislature what would it be and why?
Term limits. If I could put a rider on that, it would be that they cannot vote themselves raises. Why? Because I'm sick of career politicians.
Do fired Trump cabinet members get lifetime benefits like members of Congress?
Good question.I do not really know.Politicians look after themselves with the taxpayers money, more than they do the electorate, so no surprises Law Makers give themselves big salaries, more vacation time & certainly far superior Health Care and logic suggests they extend the freebies to the ranks. However, in & out, I doubt receive the full gamut/range & I suspect there is a ‘time earning’ caveat, like crooked McCabe, he did not lose his pension, he had been FBI for over 5 years, hence most of it is protected.
Can anybody tell me how the U.S. Congress' "Obamacare Exemption" is supposed to work?
Part of the problem is terminology. Congress was initially exempt from Obamacare because they had their own health insurance plan. What Grassley proposed was an exemption to that exemption, to force Congress to use the exchanges. The Grassley provision already excluded committee staff, only personal staff and members of Congress would have been required to use the exchanges. It's moot now, however, because during the August recess, President Obama ordered the Office of Personnel Management, which supervises federal employment issues, to interpret the law so as to retain most of the generous Congressional benefits. Some Republicans are trying to reinstate the requirement and extend it to senior White House staff (the so-called Vitter plan), but that's unlikely to go anywhere. I don't think it was intended as a poison pill. It's just a principle of good governance that government subject itself to the same rules that they impose on the rest of us.
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said that as a waitress, she had to pay more than twice for the insurance plan what she would pay as a member of Congress. How is this possible?
I have had many jobs in my life that provided health insurance (and some in my younger years that did not). The premiums were vastly different in many of the jobs, some being considerably more than others.Assuming that your employer is offering you health care, that plan generally has an premium value set by the insurance company and then your employer will pay a portion of this (which is why it is a benefit). Let’s assume all things are equal and the cost of the insurance for you remains the same, your premium from one employer to another can still vary. Say your first employer pays 75% of the premium and passes the other 25% onto you, but your next employer only pays 50% of the premium and passes the other 50% onto you. Even if these are the exact same plans with the exact same cost, the our of pocket premium to you is twice as much with one employer to the other. This is not necessarily due to the cost of the insurance (though that can be a factor as well) but is a result of how much of the premium your employer chooses to cover.Another difference is if you were not insured by the employer and were paying for individual healthcare, this would greatly increase the costs for you, as you would be responsible for 100% of the premium. It may be possible to get government subsidies to reduce the cost depending on your income, but it could end up costing you more out of pocket than if your employer was paying for it.While the situation is certainly a clear one when you look at congress, the same situation still remains when you look at many businesses compared to lower end service jobs. A benefit of a higher paying job is the “benefit package” which includes lower cost healthcare (out of pocket to you) as your employer is picking up a large portion of the tab.