Some animals are more equal than others.
They's more than being more than equal ~ they're even more than equal to their own criminal class.
In a couple more decades it will be possible that a Congress critter retiring under the FERS system will get a pay raise!
I suspect that will serve to limit service times.
Just walk it back. You'd need 101% of high 3 to beat your current salary (assuming no COLA) in those last 3 years. That would take 51 years of FERS service time ~ and for a Congress critter that can be OTHER government time whether state, local or military. Your youngest Critter would have had to have had his parent's permission to sign up for the Marines at the age of 17. Take that forward 51 years, and you'd have someone 68 years of age.
Now, deduct sick-leave. Over 40 years of regular federal service (20 terms in Congress) he'd have gotten 2080 hours of sick leave, and although not counted now for service time with FERS, it most certainly will be someday, so he could be just 67 years of age and retire from Congress and instantly draw higher pay than he was getting in Congress.
We can work that out in a combo FERS/CSRS/Military/Other government time options and it's likely someone could be in his early 50s and do that trick!
No doubt the exact computer program to figure it all out is circulating on Capitol Hill as we speak!