George Will critiques the now-ubiquitous election campaign question, "Are you better off" and concludes that it is short-sighted by failing to capture the full human experience as to what it means to be "better off":
In contemporary politics, nothing succeeds like excess, so permutations of Reagan's trope are going to recur. Therefore, it is time to consider its deficiencies, which are symptomatic of a desiccated mentality.
Unfortunately, the phrase "better off" is generally understood as a reference to your salary, your bank balance, your IRA and the like. But wait. Are you better off being four years older? That depends.
If you are young, since 2004 you might have found romance, had children, learned to fly-fish and become a Tampa Bay Rays fan. In which case you emphatically are better off, even if since 2004 there has been only a 0.6 percent increase -- yes, increase -- in the median value of single-family homes.
***
Suppose in those years you read "Middlemarch," rediscovered Fred Astaire's movies, took up fly-fishing, saw Chartres and acquired grandchildren. Even if the value of your stock portfolio is down since 2004 (the Dow actually is up), are you not decidedly better off?
***
The people asking and those answering the "better off" question seem to assume that the only facts that matter are those that can be expressed as economic statistics. Statistics are fine as far as they go, but they do not go very far in measuring life as actually lived.
Will is correct, of course, that economic statistics don't capture the elements of life that determine whether we are better off or worse off.
But his column misses the point as the question is asked in the context of a political campaign. There is an obvious unspoken qualifier to the question, which should be understood if read in context, "Are you better off with respect to the things that the government could do to improve your life." The government can't make you read (and gain happiness from) Middlemarch or Fred Astaire movies. The government can help to produce peace, security, and prosperity (sometimes, of course, by doing nothing at all). It is that sense, which I think most everyone understands, that "Are you better off?" is a perfectly reasonable and appropriate question to ask.
So it IS ironic that pols of both parties ask "Are you better off?" in an effort to get your vote when neither party's platform will make (most) people better off.
Granted, "Are you less poorly off than you would have been had the other guy won 4 years ago?" is a mouthful...
Young, but 0-4. Even my beloved Sox broke their losing streak before the election. Maybe I shouldn't have voted for Bush.
In theory, the economic status of the country will determine, for some people, whether or not they have enough money to get married, have children, or buy a house. (For young people, the crash in the housing market can be a huge boon, making previously unaffordable real estate affordable.) While the connection is certainly attenuated, there are arguably connections between the availability of art and politics - whether by outright government funding, or the effect of AMT on people's likelihood to give to charities.
Polls (and questions) like the ones mentioned, however, are simply terrible instruments for teasing any of that out.
Seriously? The government can produce these good either by doing something or not doing something? That's either a trite truism or an all-encompassing statement that really says nothing at all. Will's unspoken point (I think) is that the politics of change is at its root a politics of envy. We all like to envy. It's a very human thing. But not a very good human thing. And if that's all we're striving for in this election, well then, I'm not sure society is going to be well-off at all.
But I am sure that there are no considerations other than the purely philosophical that prompt him to say so. I also think I'm going to buy up the Brooklyn Bridge and start charging a toll on it.
Libraries, schools and universities financed from the public purse would suggest that they are.
That said, much as I do not think that one can reduce human experience to economics, Will's argument fails because economic factors can influence whether or not you get to enjoy the less measurable things in life: an economic downturn or a war may mean you can't read Middlemarch because you are working a second job to pay the bills or fighting in Iraq (or, to use the economic arguments of the right: perhaps a heavy tax burden imposed on you to pay for welfare schemes means you can't purchase said novel).
You (perhaps) can't quantify in any meaningful way the benefit gained from a novel or a movie, but you can measure whether or not such preferences are being satisifed.
When the Democrats ruin the economy, "Are you better off" is a fair question because people need jobs, houses, and money.
When the Republicans ruin the economy, "Are you better off" is not a fair question because all of the unemployed presumably have more leisure time to enjoy reading Middlemarch and following the Tampa Bay Devil Rays.
I'm not surprised that George Will is making the argument. I'm only surprised that he gets paid to make it.
But he was not a great admirer of Reagans' ideas. (Angry Will to Reagan: "I always knew you were a liberal!") Because Reagan was a liberal, in the sense that a Burkean like Will uses that term. He is not a libertarian. He doesn't denigrate government per se, although he is not thrilled with many who have governed.
When conservatives (in the American sense) say that they are the real liberals, they are expressing an idea near and dear to Reagan. But Reagan was fond of quoting Tom Paine(!). And especially the line from "Common Sense": We have it in our power to bein the world over again. Now, this is the single least conservative thing that has ever been said. And it is so manifestly untrue that it's hard to believe that Reagan believed it.
But John Patrick Diggins had it right: Reagan was a classical liberal in philosophy, and a Romantic in outlook. Neither is "conservative" in the British sense, which is the meaning of the term that Will employs when he describes himself as conservative.
Reagan was hardly his dream candidate. Nor did he refrain from criticizing what he took to be the narrow economic appeal of some of Reagan's thought.
The tendency to dismiss someone "on the other side" as a hypocrite has infected this lovely blog. Too bad. Like any thinker--and he is a sophisticated guy, like him or not--he needs to be taken on his own terms. But Will is not on the "other side" intellectually. He's off to the side. With me. And perhaps two or three other Burke/Peale/Madison/Oakeshott/Scruton conservatives.
We're very, very lonely over here. Send women.
McCain knows this, but can't afford to seem like Bush I was portrayed in 1992. Does Obama know this? I don't know. I think you liberal liberals don't agree that guv'mint spending policies don't do all that much to affect the economy.
The federal budget is about $3 trillion. The US GDP is getting toward $14 billion. Sounds like a decent percentage. But the amount over which any administration--Democratic or Gop-- actually has discression is a very small percentage of the total. If the budget were cut, the money wouldn't be taken out of the economy. It would simply be spent or invested by people who don't work on or near the Potomac.
Example: Take FDR. He significantly increased federal spending on relief. But by 1937--the eyar of the "Roosevelt Recession"-- the economy had not recovered in any significant way. It was war in Europe, which brought huge foreign spending in the US, that revived the economy.
Hoover didn't ruin the economy, and FDR didn't revive it. This doesn't mean that FDR wasn't any better than Hoover (though why liberals would criticize Hoover is beyond me). FDR was a far more successful president. But if it hadn't been for the war, he would have left office in 1940 without having done much for the mid-term economy. (His reforms contributed to the long-term strength of the US economy. But that's a very different matter.)
And Venture Brothers still kick ass.
FYI, my final econometrics paper was on the different lag effects of monetary vs. fiscal policy. Saying that the President does not affect the economy is both true and wrong. Or, in classic lawyer-speak, it depends. To given a ferinstance- the President, through the setting of policies and goals, has the single greatest influence on the (long-term) macro direction of the economy. Does the President have the effect of, say, Congress as a whole? Well, no. But because of preeminent place, and the singular nature of the executive branch, they have a disproportionate impact. Here's an example- The boom of the 1990s was largely a creation of GHWB and Clinton (via his backing of Rubin). Deficits do matter, in the signals they send to the private markets and the question of crowding out private investment. In so many ways, the President affects the long-term direction of the economy. Can the President single-handedly stop a recession or cause a boom? No. But moreso than any other single person (including Chair of the Fed.), the President affects the economy.
Sorry about the women perhaps it is a classification error, Ayn Rand is widely considered a philosopher but I cannot recall ever have seen her included in a collection of women philosophers, so maybe one of you few conservatives is really a woman. You high minded philosophical types might have missed it.***
"Econometrics paper"?!!! Isn't that like an art history regression analysis?
Two points:
1) I bet I could find a really fancy economist who can show why you are wrong. And another that can show why you are right. And a third who can show that the other two misunderstood the question. Macroeconomics is just about forcefully stating propositions, and shaking your head dismissively when someone disagrees with you.
2) I was able to understand every word you wrote. The implications are clear: You have no future in academic economics.
Not simply a flippant comment. At my institution, we have--I dunno--two dozen faculty who teach into to macro and intro to micro. Two or three get "good" reviews fro students. Many more are rated "average." Some are "below average." None are "very good" or "excellent." Keep in mind that "grade inflation" and "eval inflation" are mutually reinforcing, and you get some idea of why students dread the Econ Department.
Have you read Will's columns from the Bush I or Bush II adminsitrations? He is nothing if not intellectually consistent. (His private life is a mess, but then he doesn't write much about "family values" issues.)
Perhaps you could send us some cheerleaders?
So what am I? A turnip?
Best,
Ben
That's, um . . . different.
I'd be happy to debate Burke vs. Paine, should the thread arise. As a thinker, Plane was a very good pampleteer.
Why can't Madison be put in that august company? We are talking here about process-conservatism, right? In this sense, conservatism is the least ideological political voice. It would have to be the case that an American conservative would come to different conclusions on particular *issues* than would a Brit. But I don't see anything in Madison that leads me to think he wants to impose polcy solutions a priori. His contributions to the "Federalist" were the most focused on process. Right?
But if you like, I'll substitute Jay. Or Henry Adams.
Yet, if I did any of these things (and I have done the first two), I would be labeled an 'elitist.' 'cause when liberals do high-falutin things, it's only because we want to flaunt our superiority, unlike Will, that 'man of the people.'
Hoosier: "We're very, very lonely over here. Send women."
And men!
In this country, most people's bellies are full--or more--and so the opportunity arises to think of other things.
Like how much better off somebody else is.
Envy is a powerful political tool. It's said to be the only one of the Seven Deadly Sins which isn't any fun. IMO, if it weren't fun, nobody would be doing it.
Some useful percentage of the population is either envious of those who have time to read Middlemarch, or of those who have the interest in reading Middlemarch instead of People.
Appeals to envy are odious.
And Burke was a fine orator. :)
Most of the things government can do to improve the economy are investments in new technology, which have a lag time of about 30-40 years until their benefits are realized. While government can make some mistakes that can damage the economy in a shorter time horizon, and it can do things like buy time, such as is being done with the bailouts of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, perhaps leading to an even worse result later, it and its incumbent officials have much less to do with the current level of prosperity than most people want to believe. When people vote for or against anyone based on their current economic well-being, they are almost always doing so for a mistaken reason. It is not surprising that they don't get the desired results, and get politicians who deceive them about the results to be expected from their policies. Public leaders don't help by encouraging their error. This is an important area of reform in civic education.
What is simplistic is the false choice presumed by McCain that the only alternatives are continued corruption and violation of the First Amendment. George Will obviously does not accept this dichotomy, but could have been more explicit that it is false and that he does not accept it.
The problem that the McCain-Feingold Act ostensibly addresses is a real one. But it is also a problem that the legislation does nothing to solve it. Indeed, its net effect, like so much other legislation, is almost precisely the opposite of what was intended. The public choice system is a complex one, with intricate feedback loops that defeat simple, direct approaches to intervention. For more on this general problem see Counterintuitive Behavior of Social Systems, by Jay Forrester.
Now most members of Congress understood perfectly well that the Act would be counterproductive, even if probably none understood how it would be. That's why they voted for it. They are not going to vote for anything that might actually work to reduce corruption.
About the only thing simple about our predicament is that it is almost never necessary, except in transitory emergencies, to violate any provision of the Constitution to achieve any legitimate purpose, such as reducing the undue influence of money on public policy. There is always a constitutional alternative, and if one restricts oneself to examining constitutional alternatives, one can eventually find one that actually works, and works better than any unconstitutional one. However, it may require some very deep analysis and creativity to find it. Most legislators lack the patience and intellect to do that. And, of course, having surrendered to corruption doesn't inspire the effort.
It is all very well to invoke separation of powers, but that only works if the "same hands", that is, a single faction, don't gain control over all the parts, as they have. And they are not going to easily allow an effective separation to be reattained.
Government (and business and most other institutions) is corrupt because the people are corrupt. When the people become virtuous so will government. They are getting the government they want and deserve. They have to want clean government enough to vote for it.
Most politicians soon give up on the people becoming virtuous. They don't see any way to reform them. They abandon any idealism they once had and try to make the best of a bad situation. But, of course, they just make it worse.
Moral philosopher William James once observed the problem and found that the only thing that seemed to induce people to become virtuous was war. He didn't approve of starting wars to make people virtuous, so he sought The Moral Equivalent of War, William James (1906). But his proposed alternatives were rather weak.
Of course, there have been many religious or semi-religious movements to reform public and private virtue. Perhaps most notably the four "great awakening" movements. Evangelicals are a manifestation of that. The civil rights movement was also part of that, since the objective was not just to change laws but to change hearts. The constitutionalist and libertarian movements also grow out of such movements (even though most of their activists would be loathe to admit it).
Public choice theory and the problem of rent-seeking behavior is well understood, as are the solutions, by a few. The understanding is not, however, widely distributed or deeply impressed into the thinking of most people, especially people in government. We can work on changing that.
I believe your post misses George Will's point. George Will believes that the role of government is not limited to the economy, it involves other elements of life as well. For this reason, he believes that considering only the economy in the context of a political campaign (just as in other contexts) misses important parts of the relevant picture. He believes government can indeed improve your life in other aspects.
This view of course is one with which you have strongly disagreed. But George Will is asking a reasonable question for his own point of view. You would do better explaining why you think his point of view wrong, rather than simply assuming it as a premise.
As for the cheerleaders, I'll mention it at the next VRWC meeting. We're light there too, goodness we had to use the runner-up for Miss Alaska to fill the VP slot, but I'li try to see what I can do. The VRWC has a vested interest in keeping some real conservatives around for the smokescreen effect, so it might be doable,
Charity only extends so far.
friedman, buddy: The kink-with-fruit thread is so last week.