This is worth sharing.

[CousinIT]

Link to tweet

[Claritie Pixie]

1. Taxation without Representation.

[DemocracyMouse]

8. You got 3 out of 4 right... But ageism stinks, yo.

Oh! The unfairness of 12 year olds being shunned from congress! Frankly I'd rather be represented by folks with experience between 28 and 75. In many cases (but not all) wisdom and social skill increases with age. I expect to be working till I'm at least 75. 55 is an arbitrary and aggressively ageist line to draw. Please keep those first three charts but drop the fourth.

We do need to have fair representation of all genders, sexual persuasions and ethnicities. Let's make a chart for that.

[BlueWI]

10. I guess the facts are ageist

so we better not look at them, is that what you're contending?

We older people (I am 54) are leaving those who come after us with diminishing natural resources while many of us drive SUVs, a huge burden of national debt while we loaned out Federal Reserve funds at .75 interest, and lower funding commitments to institutions for public good and welfare (universities and schools, social safety net, functional political institutions) than has been the case for most of us.

Our record of preparing the nation for upcoming generations is nothing to brag about. I'm done being politically correct about this so-called ageism. Look at the state of the country that we're handing over for the next gen to clean up, and it seems clear that the political culture is ageist in the other direction, giving little heed to the diminishing incomes and opportunities we're leaving for younger people, as the bills keep coming in from our wars of choice and we finally get off our butts to move past the racist grifter in the White House that older people elected.

We need all ages represented in government. There's plenty of people who are eligible for social security and continue to have their say in government, but what about people with young children, people who have grown up in the internet era and have insights that others don't have?

In our last local elections this spring, a lot of us put the work in and made the city council many years younger. Some of those who lost went out protesting that younger folks couldn't do the job. So sad, they're out and not coming back. Enjoy your retirement, volunteer, and welcome in the future. Doesn't happen often enough.

Kamala Harris and Cory Booker are the vanguard. Time to move over or get moved over if you're defending the way things are. Next gen needs a voice in politics. We oldsters need to share the mic.

[DemocracyMouse]

12. I find everything you are saying offensive

I am 59 years old and have been involved with digital systems since 1981. Those "young, internet savvy people" should include people like me who know quite deeply how the world ticks. I know enough, in fact, to realize how utterly exploitive the big ring leaders of the digital age have become. (They used to be humanists and hippies and academics). But you would replace my historical knowledge with easily exploited, low-context folks who don't know enough to campaign for a union or change the system in other ways.

My health, mind you, is excellent and my wits are keen. But I must work another 30 years or until I drop because the youth culture and the "squeeze teachers dry" culture has taken away my retirement. I have been displaced by less skilled workers due to the machinations of wave after wave of "new paradigm" hyper-capitalist business leaders who have pushed out full time professors and replaced them with near-starving adjuncts. 9/11 ended my best full-time job and the Great Recession killed off my second best. It's been a scramble ever since. What privilege are you speaking of? Speak for yourself. All I said was we need not draw an arbitrary line at 55. Most people above that line are still peaking – and most of us are being passed over for prettier, younger folks with fewer skill sets.

The overpaid and under-insightful are the privileged. It has nothing to do with age. However being older quite often comes with social sensitivities which were once considered the glue of society – patience, compassion and savoir faire. And you would sell the rug out from underneith us?

Shame on you. I'm taking a knee. Try firing me for it.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

2. RepubliCONMEN are even more overwhelmingly men and white men. . . . nt

[BigmanPigman]

3. Great charts/graphs.

Of course we already knew this but seeing it in pie graphs makes it very clear how the US in not being represented fairly in Congress.

[Hermit-The-Prog]

4. compensation...

Each elected member of Congress shall receive an annual compensation equal to not more than 150% of the average annual income of the people within the congressional district the member represents. Non-cash benefits, such as pension and health care, shall likewise be provided to the elected member of like value as provided to represented citizens of the member's congressional district.

[bucolic_frolic]

5. No wonder they vote themselves tax cuts and retirement benefits

Self-interest explains a lot in the world

[aggiesal]

6. When voting on salaries and benefits, ...

they don't take effect until the next congress.
So they'll have to get re-elected to get any benefits from their vote.

Since 98% of incumbents win re-election, no doubt they will see
these benefits.

[KentuckyWoman]

11. Most of America - Congress stinks.... except mine.

I always thought that weird.

[JayhawkSD]

7. They are there because we elect them.

You can bluster about gerrymandering all you want, but we elect the local politicians who draw the gerrymandered lines, too. Too many people don't bother to vote, or vote unthinkingly for all the wrong reasons.

The bottom line, though, is that those people would not be in Congress if voters did not put them there.

[X_Digger]

9. Careful, you'll get derided for 'ageism' for pointing one of those out.

[Scurrilous]

13. K&R