Proving that good ideas do not have a specific partisan label, there is Rep. Leon Young (D–Milwaukee), as reported by the Wisconsin Reporter:

Seven days of actual debate does not a full-time Legislature make, and it’s certainly not worth the $49,943 annual salary paid to Wisconsin lawmakers,Rep. Leon Young says.

So the Milwaukee Democrat is floating an idea to make a Wisconsin legislator’s job a part-time gig – and he would slash lawmakers’ pay by 75 percent, to $12,000, as part of the deal.

“If you want to be streamlined, and both parties, especially Republicans, have always talked about saving money for the state, saving taxpayers, if you’re sincere about that, sometimes you have to look at your own house,” Young said Thursday.

Using data from the Assembly Chief Clerk’s office, Young said the Assembly only met in session for 34 days during the 2011-12 biennial session – including just seven days last year.

Yet a report from the National Conference of State Legislatures categorized Wisconsin as one of 10 states in which legislating is essentially a full-time job, requiring 80 percent or more of a lawmaker’s time.

States in that category pay their lawmakers more – an average of $68,599  each including salary, per diem and other benefits, as of 2008, according to the report.

There’s also an additional staffing cost: States with full-time legislatures have an average of 8.9 staff members per lawmaker, versus 1.2 per lawmaker in legislatures that operate part  time. …

The Reporter’s follow-up notes …

Alan Rosenthal, a Rutgers University political scientist and expert on state legislatures, said there’s “no evidence that I know of that full-time legislatures work better than part-time legislatures.”

“I think it’s likely that … full-time legislators do devote more time (to the job) because they have support, they have staff support and district office support, probably spend more time dealing with constituents and constituent services,” Rosenthal said.

“I think the largest part of that, the reason for full-time legislatures, is that legislators wanted to do politics full time,” he said. “That’s what they like.”

Such as Rep. Bob Jauch (D–Poplar):

Jauch called Young’s plan “a childish proposal.”

“It is maybe based on how hard (Young) works, but it doesn’t reflect the effort that I think most lawmakers, full or part-time, do,” Jauch said.

Young brushed off the criticism.

“Sometimes when you want to change government, streamline it, make it more efficient, you’re not always going to make people happy,” he said.

The Reporter notes that Young’s proposal is a constitutional amendment, which requires two consecutive sessions of the Legislature to approve it and a majority of voters to vote for it in a statewide referendum.

If the Republicans are serious about smaller government (and whether they are is an open question), the GOP should immediately jump on this. (If I were a Republican in the Legislature I’d double-down by reducing Young’s salary proposal by $12,000.) In fact, the GOP should jump on any and all ideas that reduce the size of government — for instance, combining the jobs of lieutenant governor, secretary of state and state treasurer into one position.

If the GOP doesn’t, Democrats can argue that Republicans say one thing about reducing government, but don’t follow through. (That’s along with the embarrassing number of Republicans who could reasonably be described as professional politicians — that is, they have done nothing other than run for or hold office.)