While those of us inside the business take it as an article of faith that judges should get a salary increase every decade or so, it turns out that a poll conducted by Siena College Research Institute shows that the public opposes a pay increase for judges.  According to the New York Lawyer and the NYLJ,

Fifty-five percent of those surveyed said they opposed raising the current $136,700-a-year salaries of Supreme Court justices while 39 percent said they would support a pay increase. Six percent said they did not know or had no opinion.

I’m always suspicious of polls like this, because the subject matter tends not to be known or understood by most people.  Why would they care how much judges earn?  Why would they care more about judicial salaries than how much they pay in taxes?  They don’t, and there’s no reason why they should.

Like a commenter here on one of my numerous judicial salary posts said, if they don’t like the pay, get a real job.  That’s the retort I would expect from most people.  Heck, I’m half inclined to say that too.

But the reaction to the poll is highly dependent on the question asked.  To many people, the bottom salary paid a New York judge still sounds pretty darned good: $136,700.  To people struggling to pay taxes and put gas in the car, whose jobs are at risk if they still have a job, it’s hard to whine about a six figure income on the public dole.  Judges just don’t “feel” underpaid to most people.  And they aren’t exactly the most sympathetic of figures, particularly when they don’t put a lot of effort into being nice to people who come before them.

What was most telling about the poll was the reaction to another question, whether legislators should get a raise.

Forty-nine percent of those surveyed opposed raising state legislator’s salaries and 45 percent said they were in favor.

Almost a dead heat, given the margin of error.  Given how ridiculously dysfunctional the New York Legislature has been forever, this response makes it clear that people aren’t reacting to what officials deserve, but to gross numbers.  They probably don’t even realize that Legislators are part-timers.  It’s just that the number, compared to judges, seems like a bargain.

Maybe judges could take a page from the teachers or cops unions about how to promote themselves to the public to increase support for their salary increase, but that would be really demeaning.  On the other hand, if they think that there will be a popular uprising against the Legislature in support of increasing judicial salaries, it looks like they are out of luck.

Leave it to the public and they would probably cut the salaries of everyone getting a public paycheck.  The public is suffering, so why should people who live off them be doing better than they are?  While this poll doesn’t have much applicability to the problems faced by New York judges, it’s a reminder to the judiciary, and to Albany, that their salary issues aren’t nearly as important to the public as our own problems.