Term Limits

Image credit: Rob Lowe: Vince Bucci/Getty Images/Newscom

CAREER LOWE Rob will leave ''West Wing'' in March

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What's the weekly pay for top White House aides? Not enough, apparently. Variety reports that Rob Lowe will leave his post at ''The West Wing'' next March because the show's producers won't raise his salary.

According to Variety, Lowe currently earns $75,000 per week playing deputy White House communications director Sam Seaborn. Not bad, but his TV boss, Martin Sheen, recently had his salary tripled to $300,000. (Sheen's real-life counterpart, President George W. Bush, earns $400,000, but that's per year.) Plus, supporting players Allison Janney, Bradley Whitford, John Spencer, and Richard Schiff each earn $70,000 per episode, having received raises last summer after they staged a walkout.

Lowe hasn't threatened a similar walkout, Variety reports, but producer Warner Bros. Television has declined to negotiate a raise with him. He may have been biggest name in the cast when the show premiered three years ago, but apparently, Warner Bros. now feels the show can survive without him. So do Emmy voters, it seems. In last week's Emmy nominations, Lowe was the only ''West Wing'' star who didn't get a nod.