The county commissioners meet today to talk about the salaries of elected officials. The elected officials on Nov. 28 compared their pay to the pay of people in the same positions in other counties.

Meanwhile, there&8217;s a statewide debate about how much university and college presidents make and whether their pay is inflated.

With all the talk about pay, here&8217;s a thought.

The annual salary for the president of the United States is $400,000. Do you think if it paid more, then more qualified people would apply for the position? We doubt it. People want to be president for reasons other than money.

The annual salary for the president of the University of Minnesota is $537,821. He makes more than the U.S. president. That in itself seems odd, but do you think that if the job paid more, then more qualified people would apply for the position? Again, we doubt it. Being the president of a Big Ten university has its own rewards.

This is our advice to university and college officials: Just because other schools stroll down the trail of overpaying their presidents, doesn&8217;t mean you have to. At some point you have to ask yourself just what are you keeping up with? Somebody&8217;s ego? That&8217;s just wrong. As stewards of tax dollars, tuition and donations, they need to worry about spending too much. Are other people out there who could do the job well, maybe even better and maybe even for less? Is &8220;bigger means better&8221; a foregone conclusion anymore?

That same advice can be applied to county elected officials. They need a salary that compensates them for their field. You can compare them to peers, but that should be one factor of many in the decision. We have to wonder that if raises weren&8217;t given, would any elected official quit? We doubt that, too. Fortunately, Freeborn County isn&8217;t in the same ridiculous problem that the University of Minnesota is in.

Our officials deserve a raise &8212; a moderate cost-of-living raise.