One legislator serves six terms then retires, citing low pay and the rising costs of being a politician, and some folks are ready to pull apart the pay structure of the Legislature. Slow down. There’s no crisis here, although there is nothing wrong with looking at how lawmakers are compensated.

State Sen. Marge Kilkelly of Wiscasset took a job in Rockland last week and announced that next term would be her last in the Legislature. She has served five terms in the House and is in her first in the Senate. Upon announcing her departure, Sen. Kilkelly said the economics of being a legislator — where the workload is high and the pay low — helped her make the decision.

People who follow the Legislature closely cannot doubt that most lawmakers work hard, under difficult conditions, to craft useful laws. Often they succeed. For their efforts, legislators are paid $18,000 for two years, and receive $32 a day for meals and up to $38 a day for a motel room or mileage. They also receive free health and dental care and, for those who serve 10 years, a pension.

It is not enough to raise a family on, but it is not supposed to be. Maine’s parttime, citizen legislature is designed to have a healthy turnover rate — a habit the public would like to maintain, if previous support for term limits is an indication. A glance at the professions of lawmakers show a wide range of backgrounds, with a significant number of retirees. This isn’t the U.S. Senate’s millionaires club.

Sen. Kilkelly notes that the $18,000 salary has not changed in the years she has been in Augusta. Certainly, inflation demands that the state increase the compensation occasionally — but probably not to the $30,000 she has suggested. That pay, while still relatively low, begins to move the state toward a full-time body, and Maine has yet to have that debate.

Instead, a lawmaker in his or her final term should propose an inflation increase for the current salary, which would then become effective in the next Legislature. The debate on a full-time could take place after that.