A Judge and His Son Undermine Arguments for Higher Judicial Pay
A high-profile federal appeals judge and his son are undermining calls for higher pay for federal judges.
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. has said federal judges are so underpaid that the problem has “reached the level of a constitutional crisis.” But Eric Posner and his father, appeals judge Richard Posner of the Chicago-based 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, are questioning the arguments for higher pay, the New York Times reports.
Federal trial judges make $169,300, and federal appeals court judges earn $179,500, according to the story. This year they were the only federal employees who did not receive a cost-of-living hike. He maintains that the real pay of judges has decreased over the years because of failure to earn cost-of-living adjustments.
Eric Posner is one of three authors of an upcoming study in The Journal of Legal Analysis with the provocative title, “Are Judges Overpaid?” A second study published in the Boston University Law Review by University of North Carolina law professor Scott Baker asks if society would be better off if judges were paid more.
Both studies found little evidence that the country would benefit if judges received higher pay, the Times story says. The studies analyzed such variables as the number of published opinions, how quickly opinions are produced and how often judges disagree with their colleagues (an effort to measure independence).
The Legal Analysis study compared the quality of state court judges to their disparate salaries, the story says. The Boston University Law Review study compared judges to pay scales at law firms in their regions. Critics say the variables analyzed aren’t a good measure of judicial quality.
Richard Posner is also skeptical. In his book, How Judges Think, the judge questioned arguments Roberts made on behalf of federal judges in 2006, the story says. For example, Posner cited Roberts’ argument that 38 judges had left the bench from 2000 to 2005, some citing low pay as the reason. According to Posner, Roberts failed to point out that most had retired rather than resigned.
Richard Posner maintains there are plenty of qualified judicial candidates, although fewer may be coming from private law firms. Roberts gave up a salary of about $1 million as a partner at Hogan & Hartson when he became an appeals judge, Bloomberg reports.
