The 50 Richest Members of Congress
September 22, 2008, 12:00 a.m.
By Paul Singer, Jennifer Yachnin and Casey Hynes
Roll Call Staff

Everything that you are about to read might be wrong.

Roll Call’s annual attempt to rank the riches of Members of Congress is hampered by one fundamental flaw: It is based on the lawmakers’ financial disclosure forms, which are extraordinarily unreliable sources of information.

The disclosure rules allow Members to report assets in broad categories, so there is no way to tell the difference between a $20 million investment and a $5 million investment. The top category on the Members’ forms is “over $50 million,â€