Today's Boston Globe "Top Emailed" story is Jeff Jacoby's editorial on Obama's economic plans. More specifically, it assails Obama's tax plan with now familiar rhetoric of forced income redistribution. I've been hearing this theme picked up on a lot recently; it play well to those who believe Democrats waste the money brought in from income tax. The column in particular goes after Obama's responses to Bill O'Reilly from this week. Here's an excerpt:
In 1972, George McGovern advocated something similar - a $1,000 "demogrant" for every US citizen. Just last year, Hillary Clinton suggested that the government start off every new baby with a $5,000 savings account. Voters didn't take the bait when McGovern and Clinton offered it. Here's betting they won't take it now.
Why not? Because you don't have to be rich to be skeptical when a candidate argues that the top 1 percent of taxpayers, who already pay 40 percent of federal income taxes, aren't being taxed enough. You don't have to be an economist to wonder about the grasp of a nominee who tells 95 percent of the public that they can have something for nothing. Obamanomics may look pretty at first glance. But voters are focusing more closely now, and they can see beyond the lipstick.
While it is a thought provoking column (and probably why it is most emailed du jour), the idea of "income redistribution" which the column attacks, is a practice embraced by both political parties. In the column, he argues increasing (or reducing loopholes for) taxes from wealthy taxpayers, as Obama's plan calls for, amounts to forced donation to the masses. He uses an example of tipping a server at a restaurant to demonstrate as a voluntary act a wealthy person could choose to leave a generous "neighborly" tip. But forcing the wealthy person to do so via taxes is not voluntary, so he does not approve.
Yet Jacoby makes no mention of the reverse, the case where the server is being forced to give money to the wealthy patron. Nor does he discuss the reality of a government where no taxes are brought in. At the least, intellectual honesty should require that he cover taxation and spending practices in Republican candidates and policies. But he does not, instead attributing taxation and redistribution only to the actions of Democrats.
Fortunately, there is a good demonstration of this to the contrary, both old and new. In an excellent, though somewhat dated column at Slate). In this 2002 column, the author discusses a AP data analysis of Congressional spending by Congress from 1995-2001, a time period in which Republicans controlled both House and Senate. The AP data is summed as follows:
What the AP is describing, then, appears to represent not only a spending shift from Democratic congressional districts to Republican ones, but also, and more significant, a spending shift from low-income people to middle- and upper-income people. The GOP, it seems, is every bit as bent as the Democrats on redistributing income; the only difference is that while Democrats want to redistribute income downward, to the poor, Republicans want to redistribute it upward, to the rich
For a more recent look, there's an interesting write up of federal spending by state based on 2005 data, and corresponding political representation, in which the author concludes:
I know it's not so cut and dried as simple party affiliation: the top 10 states include West Virginia (thanks to Robert Byrd), with a delegation that is only 20% Republican, and North Dakota, which has no Republicans in Congress at the moment. And the District of Columbia isn't even among the rankings (at $5.55/$1), for obvious reasons, given where the federal government is itself encamped, and without any voting delegation in Congress. But by taking both the top 10 and bottom 10 as a group, as shown above, it does seem to further belie the claim that the GOP is the party in favor of "fiscal responsibility" and against "the redistribution of wealth."
We need to be vigilant to this kind of misrepresentation; in Jacoby's editorial, by ignoring the historical reality of spending by both parties, and only attacking the proposed Obama plan, an unwary reader may conclude the proposed McCain plan is better, since it does not engage in "extracting money by force from someone who earned it in order to give it to someone who didn't."
If he's asserting that any government taxation is forced wealth redistribution, he should also scrutinize the McCain economic plan. It does not call to do away with taxes. He should also discuss how the taxes brought in will impact the voting public. In light of tax changes the McCain plan does call for, he should offer his opinion how this will affect our ability to fund our military, continue to maintain our roads, parks, and government buildings, instantiate economic growth at home, and which of the many programs government is currently engaged in will be eliminated. This would be the fair means of influencing his readers' views.