Alabama’s 140 state lawmakers will earn $66,659 next year, a 7.15% increase over this year, according to the Alabama State Personnel Department.
A decade ago, a 2012 voter-approved constitutional amendment tied legislators’ salaries to the state’s median household income.
The amendment initially was a pay cut for many lawmakers, putting their salaries at $42,849 in 2015. Since then, they’ve received raises each year except for two.
The household earning figure comes from the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey. It increased from $62,212 in 2023 to $66,659 in 2024, which lawmakers will now be making.
The 2012 constitutional amendment sponsored by Republicans, still newly in control of the Legislature, was a response to previous Democrat-pushed pay increases.
In 2007, the then-Democratic-controlled Legislature passed a 61% pay raise, overriding the veto of then-Gov. Bob Riley, a Republican. Backlash over that raise, which put legislative salaries at $49,500 and included annual raises, helped the GOP take over the Legislature in 2010.
Lawmakers are now earning nearly $24,000 more than in 2015, but would be getting more without the 2012 amendment. Alabama Daily News previously reported lawmakers would have gotten $69,757 in 2024 under a previous raise structure, according to an analysis by the Legislative Services Agency.
Lawmakers earn the same amount whether they’re in the annual 15-week legislative session or not and don’t receive additional money for special sessions or other out-of-session work.
The 2012 amendment allows most lawmakers to be reimbursed more for travel to and from Montgomery.
In-state travel for the Legislature, including employees, went from $40,152 in fiscal 2014 to $1 million in fiscal 2025, according to spending records available at open.alabama.gov.