Mexico's president-elect will take 60 percent pay cut
Throughout his campaign, Mexico's president-elect, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, vowed to fight corruption and cut down on perks for government officials, and on Sunday, he announced his plan to slash his own salary in half.
López Obrador said that he will earn 108,000 pesos, or about $5,707, a month, less than half what President Enrique Peña Nieto makes now. He also said no public official will earn more than he does during his six-year term. "What we want is for the budget to reach everybody," López Obrador told reporters.
Other changes he plans on making include cutting perks for elected officials like bodyguards, chauffeurs, and private medical insurance; forcing politicians to disclose their assets; ending pension plans for former presidents; and turning the presidential residence into a cultural center. He will take office in December.
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Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.
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