A Deep Dive Into How Much Representatives Spent on Travel in Q4 of 2020
Congressmen and women across the country spend thousands a year for campaigning, personal expenses and travel expenses, but what exactly may those transactions cost them? Specifically in Q4 of 2020 and in the height of the pandemic, we can see how expenses range between person to person and state to state. When taking a deep dive into travel expenses, in a csv file found off “propublicas” website, Texas and California have the largest amount of travel expenses (or AMOUNT) for Q4 of 2020; that being said, they have more bodies in Congress than say Alaska, even though it is the largest state in the United States of America. Even with the highest amount of expenses on travel, Texas and California aren’t even close to the top per-capitas between the states. In taking a look into the kinds of “purposes” each congressmen expenses their travel costs as, they can range anywhere from, “commercial transportation” to a very common purpose, which would be lodging. From state to person, there is a considerable amount of factors into why or how there could be so much money spent on travel, in which will be explained further.
When looking first into the highest paying congressmen and women when it comes to travel expenses, there also seems to be a correlation between the highest paying state when it comes to travel expenses. The state with the most travel expenses is Texas with a total of $295,437.70. The congressmen with the highest travel expenses is HON. Lance Gooden from Texas with a total $28,023.82. His highest expense purpose was under “commercial transportation”. He represents Texas’ 5th district and with Texas being one of the biggest states in America, this could be a huge reason as to why his expenses and other congressmen in Texas travel expenses are the highest out of any state. In relation to each states spending amount, per-capita also comes into play when considering the average amount each congress person would pay from each state.
When it comes to per-capita, the total amount spent per state, does not necessarily correlate with the highest per-capita in each state; this meaning that even though Texas was the highest expensed state with the highest expensed congressmen, doesn’t mean they are the state with the highest per-capita. What comes to a shock, but at the same time makes the most sense, is that the Virgin Islands had the largest per-capita in Q4 of 2020 of $31,534. Per-capita was able to be calculated by dividing amount (travel expenses by state) by the number of congressmen or delegates of each state. The definition of per-capita means that the per unit of population; in simpler terms, the highest income or expense of any state, equal to each “individual”. The Virgin Islands has one delegate who can participate in debates and since there is only one, their per-capita is equal to their total expenses; but, since they are farther from most of the states, their expenses and per-capita would automatically be further due to airfare, plus additional costs.
In terms of calculating just travel expenses, the categories were able to be split up into just travel. In calculating each number of congressmen in each state, a value_counts() was used to grab the total number of people in congress. The state of California had the most congressmen with Texas as the runner up. In comparing spending costs between each state, grabbing each party based off Democrat or Republican was a useful visual. In this catplot below, there is barely a difference between the total amount spent in travel between Democrats and Republicans and this could be because there was almost an even number of Democrats to Republicans, or all take travel into serious consideration when upcoming elections appear.
On the other hand, per-capita compared to Democrats to Republicans is drastically different. As you can see in the chart below, the democrats per-capita was just above 5,000, whereas the Republicans per-capita was just under 8,000. This means that republicans across the US are on average more likely to spend more on travel expenses than Democrats. Even though republicans may spend more individually, the ones lacking make up for the Democrats who do spend, which put the total amount spend between the two almost even for total expenses (AMOUNT).
Another way of comparing Democrats and Republicans in travel expenses was looking at what particular house they are in, relating to CHOB, RHOB and LHOB. In this figures below, Republicans tower or Democrats when it comes to total amount and per capita per different house they may relate to. LHOB was the lowest spender in total when it came to travel expenses, but the highest when it came to per-capita. This could be because they have less delegates or congressmen in LHOB that their per-capita would need to be higher in order to get more attention, but their total expenses would be lower compared to other houses with more representatives. On the other hand, the highest expensed house was LHOB, falling right under $12,000 in total travel expenses, where as the per capita fell right under $8,000. LHOB falls right below LHOB when it comes to per-capita, with RHOB with the lowest per-capita, falling right under $7,700.
As stated above, there could be many factors into why there are differentiating expenses between states- from representatives to a states size. In order to un-blur the line for some, the budget between the states and individual representatives needs to be more clear. In terms of travel expenses, given the csv files, what truly determines a travel expense; considering representatives have a higher total on different types of travel expenses. With all the data given, there is a conclusion that there is a correlation between the highest travel expense states and congressmen, but no correlation between the highest expensed state/congressmen and their respective per-capita.
