So says E. J. Dionne in this Washington Post op ed which is well worth reading. He says they are failing us and themselves, reminds us that in previous generations the wealth accepted that their good fortune imposed an obligation upon them, including from "an old fashioned sense of civic duty." Or to put it a simple phrase:
“Noblesse oblige” sounds bad until it doesn’t exist anymore.
Dionne argues that the wise wealthy recognize that its prosperity is better assured if the entire society gets some benefit and the ruling elite is not a closed class because
A ruling class closed to new talent doesn’t remain a ruling class for long.
He thinks there is something wrong with the current generation of wealthy who seem so focused merely on maximizing wealth. Heck, he even notes that as least David Koch has been generous to Lincoln Center!
I want to explore a bit more of what he offers, including things like observations from David Cay Johnson. I also want to place the title in a broader context.
First, the portion of the column quoting Johnson:
“The effective rate for the top 400 taxpayers has gone from 30 cents on the dollar in 1993 to 22 cents at the end of the Clinton years to 16.6 cents under Bush,” he said in a telephone interview. “So their effective rate has gone down more than 40 percent.”
He added: “The overarching drive right now is to push the burden of government, of taxes, down the income ladder.”
And you wonder where the deficit came from.
The statistics should not be new to anyone paying attention. Yet we will not win arguments merely with statistics, because our statistics will be countered and obfuscated with other statistics until the average voter experiences MEGO - my eyes glaze over.
Arguing with statistics only works when it can be place into powerful images, for example this one in this piece from Stan Karp:
n my home state of New Jersey, there’s a man named David Tepper who manages the Appaloosa Hedge Fund. Last year, Tepper made $4 billion as a hedge fund manager. This was equal to the salaries of 60 percent of the state’s teachers, who educate 850,000 students. But Gov. Christie rolled back a millionaire’s tax and cut $1 billion out of the state school budget, so people like Tepper would have lower taxes. It’s not only impossible to sustain a successful public school system with such policies, it’s also impossible to sustain anything resembling a democracy for very long.
One man's income was equal to that of 60% of the states teachers, who educate 850,000. A powerful image, even as it is almost impossible to imagine.
What if we extend the use of that image? What if we point out to the David Teppers of the world, or at least those who are not so sociopathic that they still have some concern for others, that if we do not educate those 850,000 students they will not have customers, and thus they will not be able to continue accruing wealth? Maybe that will not matter to a hedge fund manager, who does not care about the underlying business activities on which he can make a fortune whether it succeeds or fails - although eventually if too many businesses fail even hedge fund operators will feel the pinch. What about the man who has a chain of auto dealerships? Or fast food restaurants? What about the man heavily invested in manufacturing? He may be able to save some costs by manufacturing offshore, but he still has to have customers.
Those advocating broad based tax cuts are prone to quote John F. Kennedy's phrase about his broad-based tax cuts, that a rising tide lifts all boats. That expression is perhaps more accurately applied when an expanding economy has benefits that are spread across the economic spectrum, not concentrated into the hands of those who already possess sufficient wealth to weather any momentary economic downturn.
There is also a concern about fairness upon which Johnson touches. Who pays for the costs of government. He rightly notes that our recent tax and funding policy has had the effect of pushing the cost of government down upon those making less. The other side of this is that the benefits have been accruing increasingly to those at the top, which is why their share of the wealth has been expanding at what should be a horrifying rate.
Dionne notes that the elites need to recognize their duty to pay for the instruments of force that protect them and their wealth, the military and the police. He quotes John Judis as noting that
the American establishment has at crucial moments had “an understanding that individual happiness is inextricably linked to social well-being.” What’s most striking now, by contrast, is “the irresponsibility of the nation’s elites.”
Here we can look at the actions not only of the likes of the Koch Brothers attempting to so fund political activity as to give state governments like that under Walker in Wisconsin sufficient power to turn over then wealth of the public directly to private interests with no oversight from the public; it also applies to the likes of those hedge fund operators involved with Democrats for Education Reform who are devastating public education in the process of making larger profits for their economic interests.
For my standpoint, I care not if the wealthy elites are Democratic or Republican. I do care how they use the wealth that gives them power, wealth that would not be possible absent the actions - or in some cases inactions - of a government established by "We the People of the United States.
We have now commenced our sesquicentennial commemoration of the Civil War. We are still two and half years away from the anniversary of the expounding of what Lincoln said was a reason for that great war - that "government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth."
All of us have a responsibility to our society. It is one reason I maintain a position often considered in the minority here, that of a responsibility to service broadly defined. I do not support a military draft, even as I recognize that political leaders might be somewhat less eager to put the children of the elites at risk. Unless we can grasp that ALL of us have an obligation to serve, it becomes somewhat more difficult to make the argument about fair sharing of all public burdens, including that of financial support of the government and the society.
For those of a religious bent, sacred texts provide much support for such a position. Whether it is the charity of the Jewish law - not plowing the corners of one's fields and leaving them for the gleaners among the poor - or the example in Acts of the Apostles:
There was not a needy person among them, for as many as were possessors of lands or houses sold them, and brought the proceeds of what was sold
and laid it at the apostles' feet; and distribution was made to each as any had need.
No, I am not arguing for the communism of that early Christian community, but rather using it to illustrate the principle that the early Church recognized that ALL needed to be provided for. It would be possible to do outside of government, but the spirit of generosity required is even greater than the sense of obligation to pay one's fair share of taxes. And since our system of government is, despite some way on the other side of the political divide, not founded on any religious principle - after all, Article VI of the Constitution makes clear there shall be no religious test for any office or public benefit under the Constitution - I prefer framing it as a part of how we define our government, our society, on a civil basis. We chose to amend the Constitution to allow for taxes on income to pay for the services that enabled people to earn that income.
Dionne makes the point that compared to other nations we do a poor job either of investing in the future - our crumbling and out of date infrastructure and our underfunding of public education demonstrate this - or of " improving the lives and opportunities of the less affluent" - we spend the most on health care but with uneven results, high infant mortality, decreasing life expectancies for many, and a decreasing economic future for an ever increasing proportion of our society.
But forget my words. Heck, forget the words of E. J. Dionne. Perhaps instead we should use the words of a Republican President, as Dionne does to close his piece:
“A blind and ignorant resistance to every effort for the reform of abuses and for the readjustment of society to modern industrial conditions represents not true conservatism, but an incitement to the wildest radicalism.” With those words in 1908, President Theodore Roosevelt showed he understood what a responsible ruling class needed to do. Where are those who would now take up his banner?
a responsible ruling class - ignore for a moment whether in fact we should have a ruling class, or if we should if it should be defined by wealth. After all, part of Dionne's argument is that the boundaries between classes should be porous, not rigid. That in fact has been part of the beauty of America. One could in one generation go from working class to very wealthy and thus very influential. Rather, think of the question of responsibility: what does it mean, what should it mean? Should this be part of our educational task, to ensure that all understand that because they benefit from the society and the government they have a responsibility to give back? Or will we continue to fragment as a society so that we will cease to have any common purpose among us, and each will seek to manipulate the structures and powers of government solely to their own benefit?
If the latter, the risk of civil disorder increases greatly. And remember, we are a heavily armed society, and many of those currently of wealth perhaps ought to consider how vulnerable they could be, even in their gated communities. It is to their best interest to keep the society stable with the people down the economic scale neither losing hope nor becoming angry.
Nor should they attempt to foment anger against part of society - perhaps as defined by race or religion - in order to divide and conquer. When a fire is lit in a room full of explosive and incendiary material, it is hard to control the direction of the ensuing conflagration.
The elites SHOULD have a duty to the rest of us.
And we should have a duty to them, to call them to account, before it is too late, before the society that has enabled them to have an elite status becomes destroyed before the eyes of all of us.