We love America. It’s Americans we can’t stand.
by Tom Sullivan
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez recently argued that people’s lives are not commodities. Why do we treat them as though they are? “That is what makes the price of medicine different than the price of an iPhone,” the New York Democrat insists.
“people’s lives are not commodities” pic.twitter.com/BSPEmlb2HO— mike casca (@cascamike) November 27, 2019
Responding to AOC’s statement, progressive messaging maven Anat Shenker-Osorio tweeted, “And *this* is why we must immediately stop framing #Medicare4All as the cheaper option. When we do, we reinforce the opposition’s worldview and undermine the truth that life and health can not be sales items.”
How we think about money is a muddled mess. An old experiment in mental accounting illustrates this using a choice between purchasing a jacket and a calculator (image):
The choice is the same: Would you drive 20 minutes to save $5? All else being equal, over two-thirds of test subjects would make the trip to save on the lower-priced item. Less than a third would for the higher priced item. For the same $5.
Our thinking on who benefits from tax spending is equally convoluted. It’s driving Pete Buttigieg’s* latest ad on funding free college. We shouldn’t be offering free college to the kids of millionaires, he suggests:
New Pete ad in Iowa taking aim at Warren and Bernie over college affordability/debt (but not by name), arguing they’d alienate half the country by insisting it be “free even for the kids of millionaires”. H/t @McCormickJohn
pic.twitter.com/SEAcOdHcAq— Alex Thompson (@AlxThomp) November 29, 2019
It’s the same argument made by Americans who argue, sure they’d like universal health coverage, but not if the Somali family down the street gets it too.
The sun rises each day on the evil and the good, Jesus says. And the rain falls on the just and the unjust. But dammit, the “undeserving” people across the street better not get a cent of my tax dollars! Sure, they get fire and police protection. They get public schools and publicly funded retirement and senior health care. The most powerful military in the world defends them 24/7/365. But giving the rich free college (as though they’d use it) or the poor treatment when they fall ill, well, that crosses a line. AOC doesn’t think so. But a lot of us do, including smart guys like Mayor Pete.
Brian Beutler tweets that Mayor Pete’s logic would lead him to means testing Medicare and Social Security to keep taxes low. The Net had a field day with Buttigieg:
Next-up from Pete:
No more Social Security for those making over $100K
No more K-12 for families making over $100K
No more fire dept's for those making over $100K
No more roads for those making over $100K
No more public libraries for those making over $100K = Nothing for anyone https://t.co/pvkIUuVZDC— Warren Gunnels (@GunnelsWarren) November 30, 2019
We judge our national security priceless. That’s why the U.S. spends as much as the “next seven largest military budgets around the world, combined.” We waste hundreds of billions on boondoggle weapons. Nobody asks how we are going to pay for them. But universal health care? Free college? Hell, no.
We love America. It’s Americans we can’t stand.
What makes national programs politically viable is their very universality. Start means-testing them, offer them to some and not to others and support declines. That’s why conservatives insist on means-testing. To wedge this group against the next. Divide and conquer. Democrats should not play that game.
What we do as a country is what makes America great as a country. Your personal achievements don’t, not matter how proud you are of them. Sen. Elizabeth Warren taught contract law before running for office. She understands social ones:
“There is nobody in this country who got rich on his own. Nobody.
“You built a factory out there? Good for you. But I want to be clear: you moved your goods to market on the roads the rest of us paid for; you hired workers the rest of us paid to educate; you were safe in your factory because of police forces and fire forces that the rest of us paid for. You didn’t have to worry that marauding bands would come and seize everything at your factory, and hire someone to protect against this, because of the work the rest of us did.
“Now look, you built a factory and it turned into something terrific, or a great idea? God bless. Keep a big hunk of it. But part of the underlying social contract is you take a hunk of that and pay forward for the next kid who comes along.”
For all the “values” talk that gets thrown around during election campaigns, our are pretty screwed up. How we think about money is a big part of it.
* Sullivan is a name insufficiently exotic enough for the times, isn’t it?