the whole stock trading thing is largely a result of how little congress people are payed relative to the importance of the position.

Completely unreal. Given an opportunity to legally trade on the information available to them people with 6 and 7 figure salaries will act identically to maximize their benefit. At present in many difficult and valuable professions you can obtain the best of the best for less than what congress is paid. There is no reason to believe that lifetime benefits, 174k and the prestige of leading the nation is insufficient to attract excellent candidates.

If the candidates presently in play are often trash it is because other factors select for same not because of insufficient compensation.