Why Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Refuses To Own Private Stocks

6 months ago

Forbes money in politics reporter Kyle Mullins joined Brittany Lewis on "Forbes Newsroom" to discuss the net worth of Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY).

READ MORE: https://www.forbes.com/sites/kylemullins/2024/05/03/no-aoc-isnt-rich-yet-alexandria-ocasio-cortez/?sh=6ff59cd13fa8

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Transcript

00:00 But tell us now, as you've reported, her net worth is now one hundred and twenty five thousand dollars.

00:06 What assets make that up?

00:07 So the vast majority of that, about one hundred thousand dollars or so, is actually our estimate of how much she's put away in retirement savings.

00:16 It's tough to know because Congress people don't actually have to disclose the balances in their thrift savings accounts, which is the sort of the 401k equivalent for government employees.

00:29 But we estimate that if she's been meeting her match and she's been getting those matching funds that people who get 401ks also also typically get,

00:37 she gets five percent match.

00:38 That would be about one hundred thousand dollars as of this year.

00:41 The other assets in that that we're talking about, we're making up that that fortune of hers.

00:46 We have a couple of cash accounts, savings accounts, that kind of thing.

00:50 None of them are larger than the sort of smallest bracket that they have to disclose, which is between one and fifteen thousand dollars worth of value.

00:58 That's pretty big range, of course.

01:00 It's hard to know exactly where it sits in there.

01:02 So we usually take the median.

01:05 And then besides that, it's her pension, which she became eligible for this year after five years of service in Congress.

01:13 And that's only worth about fifteen thousand dollars right now.

01:16 But of course, the longer she stays in Congress, the more and more that that will grow.

01:20 You mentioned that when she first was sworn into Congress, she couldn't afford an apartment.

01:27 Does she own any real estate now?

01:29 She doesn't, as far as we know, she still rents in both New York and D.C.

01:34 And she's a big proponent of student loan debt cancellation.

01:40 How much does she owe in student loans?

01:42 So she doesn't have an enormous amount anymore.

01:45 She's talked about this publicly and she said in twenty twenty one that her balance was around seventeen thousand dollars.

01:50 We're estimating that assuming she's been making regular payments, it's around fifteen thousand these days.

01:55 That's also the range that we have on her disclosure and it starts at fifteen thousand dollars.

01:59 So we're assuming it's pretty close to the lower end of that range there.

02:03 But I mean, other than that, she doesn't have any other debts that she's reporting.

02:06 When you were reporting on her waitress salary, you said she was making twenty seven thousand dollars a year.

02:13 What is her congressional salary today?

02:16 Congressional salaries are one hundred and seventy four thousand dollars for your everyday member of Congress.

02:23 That actually hasn't changed in about a decade or over a decade.

02:26 Congress has routinely paused the sort of annual increase that would come with cost of living.

02:34 And AOC has actually been a vocal proponent of raising congressional salaries.

02:38 She argues that it makes that if you keep the salaries too low, people are more likely to go try to find more corrupt income elsewhere.

02:46 So maybe they go trade stocks that they aren't supposed to trade in or they try to go do other various deals.

02:53 She refuses to own private stocks.

02:55 That's something that she has made part of her persona.

02:57 But she has argued that Congress should be paid more than they are today.

Why Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Refuses To Own Private Stocks

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