REGINA – The Canadian Taxpayers Federation is calling out the high salaries of provincial politicians in Saskatchewan and Canada compared to those paid south of the border.
According to the latest Subnational Politician Pay Report released from the CTF on Thursday, Canadian members of the Legislature were paid far more than their counterparts in American state legislatures in 2025.
According to their study, the median Canadian provincial politician salary came in at $113,637, or nearly three times the salary of the median American state representatives at $45,002.
Saskatchewan MLAs themselves earned a base salary of $113,432, which is near the middle of the pack for Canadian provinces. They also got a pay raise of 2.1 per cent or $2,333 last year according to CTF.
While the MLAs are paid more than American state representatives, CTF points out the province’s GDP per capita is lower than 23 of the American states, and their top combined marginal tax rate is higher than rates in 46 American states, according to CTF.
“Saskatchewan MLAs are among the highest paid politicians in North America but they're not delivering better results” said Gage Haubrich, CTF Prairie Director. “We're paying politicians the big bucks. We're not getting the big results.”
Haubrich points out those six-figure base pay numbers for MLAs do not even count the several thousands in additional compensation on top of that for cabinet ministers, and even more for the Premier.
“This is just the same backbench MLA who hangs out at the back of the legislature, and that's still double what the average American state representative is making,” said Haubrich.
Haubrich said only about six states pay their representatives more than what Saskatchewan MLAs are paid, and “some of those are pretty huge states like New York and California where obviously even the cost of living in those places is super high as well. Not like it is in Saskatchewan.”
One argument people make in favour of higher MLA compensation levels is a need to be able to attract capable people to politics away from the lucrative salaries of the private sector.
But Haubrich doesn’t buy that, and believes the CTF report “essentially shows that that's a myth.”
“Saskatchewan politicians are among the best paid in North America, but we're not getting the results for those huge payments, right? We're seeing that the province is much poorer than many American states and charges more taxes than many American states, despite the politicians in those states getting paid a lot less than the politicians in Saskatchewan.”
Haubrich also notes that when a representative is being paid much closer to the average salary of a place, they “understand the concerns that people have a lot better as well.”
He adds that politics is "supposed to be about how to best serve constituents, not to put more money in your own pocket.” Haubrich said politicians who are focused on getting pay raises and padding their own paychecks “can't be focused on lowering taxpayer tax bills and delivering economic prosperity.”
