“Every year since 1990, Roll Call has raked through congressional financial disclosure forms to create our Wealth of Congress Index. In the course of analyzing the data of the 50 richest members of Congress, the 10 “poorest” and all the others elected to represent Americans in the Capitol, we discovered scores of interesting things that illustrate how they made their money, how they keep it and how some use the illusion of transparency to their advantage. The disclosure forms are imperfect at best — members are required to report values in broad ranges of minimums, starting at $1 to $1,000 and ending with any asset or liability worth $50 million or more. Our equation for calculating the minimum net worth of each member remains unchanged: Total minimum reported value of assets minus total minimum reported value of liabilities equals total minimum net worth. This year’s Wealth of Congress Index, derived from forms covering the 2014 calendar year, shows it took a minimum net worth of $7.28 million to crack the exclusive 50 richest club. The full list, with breakdowns of members’ assets and liabilities, is here.”
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