Via EURSOC, and they could teach Chicago a thing or 3 - typical socialists
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Travel On a summer day in Strasbourg, Martin, camera rolling, casually chatted up Paasilinna, the laconic Finnish Social Democrat who was weighing a new job and the pay cut it would bring. Paasilinna explained how through perks his Parliament income could rise to more than E240,000 a year.
With gentle prodding from Martin, Paasilinna said that on top of his monthly legislative salary of E5,000, he pockets E2,500 of his general E3,700 monthly expense allotment. But the biggest boon, he said, was travel. Depending on the cost of a tourist ticket, a weekly round-trip flight of 1,800 kilometers, about 1,120 miles, between Helsinki and Brussels could result in tax-free payments of up to E2,500, he said. "So if you take 2,500 four times a month, thatâs 10,000," he said.
Adding up his monthly take, he concluded in a dry voice, "It is almost 20,000."
In the odd arithmetic of Brussels, airfare expenses, regardless of actual cost, are paid out at the highest economy fare listed for a route.
This flexible, unrestricted fare is called the "YY" and, according to Hugo van Reijen, author of "Why Not Fly Cheaper?" a book about discount airfares, it is paid by a relative handful of travelers. "The full fare is easily five to 10 times the discounted fare in Europe," he said.
Last week, for example, the Travelocity Web site offered a round trip between Helsinki and Brussels on Brussels Airlines for about E200. But under Parliamentâs compensation rate, Paasilinna, judging from the most recent figures obtained by the Herald Tribune and The Times, would have been reimbursed for a fare of roughly E1,700, and also for another E357 for traveling more than 1,500 kilometers.
With similar math, a Parliament member from Berlin receives roughly a E1,000 payment for a round trip to Brussels (cost on Travelocity, about E169 on Brussels Airlines). Over a year, the profit can run into the tens of thousands of euros.
In a recent interview, Paasilinna could not recall the details of his conversation with Martin, and said his monthly income was more on the order of E12,000. But he said the system still warranted reform.
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