By Bob Katzen

The base salary for the state’s 40 state senators rose from $73,655 for the 2023-2024 session to $82,046 for the 2025-2026 session. That’s an 11.39 percent hike which means an additional $8,391 per senator. The estimated price tag for the hikes is $335,640.

Gov. Maura Healey announced these hikes in January. Under state law, Legislative salaries are up for adjustment in January every two years, either up or down, under a 1998 constitutional amendment approved by a better than two-to-one margin by voters. It requires that every two years the salaries of the governor, the other five constitutional statewide officers and the state’s 40 senators be increased or decreased based on data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) that measures the quarterly change in salaries and wages.

It also requires that the same formula be used every two years to increase or decrease the stipends that all 40 senators receive for their service in Democratic or Republican leadership positions, as committee chairs or vice chairs and as the ranking Republican on some committees.

Senators’ base salaries were $46,410 when the voters approved the automatic pay adjustments in 1998. Since that time, the salaries have been increased every two years except for a $306 pay cut for the 2011-2012 session; an $1,100 pay cut for the 2013-2014 session; and a salary freeze for the 2015-2016 legislative session.
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The new $82,046 salary means that the base Senate salary has been raised $35,636 or 76 percent, since the mandated salary adjustment became part of the state constitution in 1998.