Biden Plans to Live off Taxpayers Forever
Admits to lack of savings, desire to subsist on six-figure government pension
Joe Biden / AP
Vice President Joe Biden plans on relying solely on taxpayers to fund his retirement.
Biden declared on Monday that he had neither a savings account, nor any stocks to pay off his golden years.
“I have no savings account, but I have a great pension and a great salary,” Biden told the crowd at the White House Summit on Working Families.
Biden proudly admitted that he was “the poorest member of Congress” over his four-decade career in Washington. The line garnered laughs and applause at the plush Omni Hotel in Georgetown. However, Biden’s poor financial planning means that taxpayers will have to foot the bill for his retirement.
When Biden and Obama vacate the White House, they will have to make due with a $5 million “transition budget” that will cover their move out expenses, as well as Secret Service protection, according to the Congressional Research Service. Biden, however, will benefit from more than just the presidential transition budget.
Biden, 71, will be eligible for a substantial pension come 2017. While former presidents earn about $200,000 per year from their executive pension, vice presidents, who serve as the President of the Senate, draw their pension from congressional pension pools. Former members of congress are paid “no more than 80 percent” of their highest three years salary.
Despite Biden’s failure to save or invest money, his role as vice president will enable him to draw a six-figure pension paid for by taxpayers.
Biden admitted that he was lucky that his career as a senator and vice president allowed him to play fast and loose with his finances, pointing out that even in his poorest days, he was earning twice the median salary.
“I was making $42,000 a year, that was good. The average salary was $19,000,” he said of his early Senate career.
Biden now earns more than $230,000 per year. He is guaranteed an even larger salary over the remaining two years of President Obama’s term, as his salary comes with automatic cost of living adjustments.
When Biden released his tax returns during his 2008 presidential bid, it was revealed that he and his wife, Dr. Jill Biden, earned an average salary of just $245,000 per year over 10 years.
Biden’s fiscal disclosure comes as potential 2016 rival Hillary Clinton has in recent weeks touted the poverty she experienced after leaving the White House. Former Secretary of State Clinton, who says she is not “truly well off,” earns $200,000 for every speech she gives and has a net worth of more than $50 million.
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