The 15 Lies That Built A Right-Wing Scam
I've been reading Joshua Holland's The Fifteen Biggest Lies About the Economy (and Everything Else the Right Doesn't Want You To Know About Taxes, Jobs, and Corporate America). Even as voracious a reader as I am, I rarely describe a non-fiction book as something you don't want to put down, but this one certainly qualifies. Everyone should read this before you vote. Get copies for your family and friends, even.
A lot of the material itself will be familiar ground for most people who are familiar with progressive politics. But where Mr. Holland does a great job is in methodically dissecting every right-wing economic lie and distortion step-by-step. While it would be possible to skip around to read about your favorite issues, the book offers so much more if it's read in order. Slowly, one myth at a time, Mr. Holland lets the entire right-wing scam unfold naturally, stringing together one fact after another until all is revealed.
For someone who's a middle-of-the-road voter or even an open-minded conservative, the book will come as an eye-opener. It avoids hyperbole and the use of ideology as an end in itself in favor of a sober presentation of history and fact. You can't help but find the argument persuasive.
And if you are a progressive and this book doesn't make you hopping mad and very motivated to do your part (vote, donate, volunteer, etc) to keep Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan out of the White House, I don't know what will.
Some highlights:
1. Conservatives make the mistake of assuming that because they view "small government" as a goal in itself, that progressives must do the same. But truthfully, progressives couldn't care less about the size of government; they merely want government that works and that solves the problems we need it to solve.
2. Government spending, relative to the size of the economy has stayed nearly flat for decades regardless of which party controlled the White House or Congress. In fact, government spending has even dipped slightly during Democratic administrations. What the media portrays as a fight about the size of government is really a fight about priorities.
3. There's a consensus in this country that we want Big Government. When people say the government is too big, they are merely referring to the parts of government they don't like. Conservatives actually spend like drunken sailors when they hold the purse strings and couldn't care less about the deficit or the national debt. The difference is that conservatives will also starve the government of revenue, leading to huge deficits.
4. The idea that lowering taxes leads to greater revenue is an idea that persists despite having long since been debunked by actual economists. Conservative media outlets have an editorial line about the so-called "Laffer Curve" that writers are not allowed to cross. But the truth is, even people who are firmly in the conservative camp acknowledge that at US levels of taxation, the Laffer Curve doesn't apply and that lowering taxes will never lead to more government revenue.
5. There are numerous factors leading to the decline of upward economic mobility in the US, starting with an extremely weak educational system. The wealth of your parents has now become the single greatest statistical predictor of how you will do in life. It's becoming harder than ever to get ahead due to the elimination of paths to the middle and upper classes that used to exist and exist no longer.
6. The standard conservative line that the mortgage meltdown was caused by poor people taking out loans they couldn't afford because the government mandated that the banks grant such loans is a complete fabrication. There are no government mandates to make unhealthy loans and there never have been. Bad loans were made because they were the poker chips needed for the casino gamblers on Wall Street to run a variety of scams on the American people, knowing that if trouble hit, they could merely cry "too big to fail" and get bailed out by Uncle Sam.
7. The financial sector itself is a bloated and inefficient part of the economy. Furthermore, it provides no direct benefit in and of itself. It's only benefit is providing the support that allows actual commerce to take place -- in other words, finance is what economists call an "intermediate good". Much like trucking, for example. It is this bloated and inefficient sector of the economy that provides an intermediate good that was deemed "too big to fail". Think about that one for a moment.
8. Much of the evils in the rest of corporate America can be traced directly back to the financial sector. When the media says that "the markets" see things this way or that way, all they mean is the opinions of the economic elites who hold stocks on whether they are getting a good short-term return on their investment. Fail to meet the numbers and your company's stock is pounded. Thus, the financial sector, instead of serving the rest of the economy, has taken control of the rest of the economy. Corporate CEOs are pressured to do things that actually harm their own companies -- to say nothing of the rest of society -- to meet quarterly earnings expectations.
A lot of the material itself will be familiar ground for most people who are familiar with progressive politics. But where Mr. Holland does a great job is in methodically dissecting every right-wing economic lie and distortion step-by-step. While it would be possible to skip around to read about your favorite issues, the book offers so much more if it's read in order. Slowly, one myth at a time, Mr. Holland lets the entire right-wing scam unfold naturally, stringing together one fact after another until all is revealed.
For someone who's a middle-of-the-road voter or even an open-minded conservative, the book will come as an eye-opener. It avoids hyperbole and the use of ideology as an end in itself in favor of a sober presentation of history and fact. You can't help but find the argument persuasive.
And if you are a progressive and this book doesn't make you hopping mad and very motivated to do your part (vote, donate, volunteer, etc) to keep Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan out of the White House, I don't know what will.
Some highlights:
1. Conservatives make the mistake of assuming that because they view "small government" as a goal in itself, that progressives must do the same. But truthfully, progressives couldn't care less about the size of government; they merely want government that works and that solves the problems we need it to solve.
2. Government spending, relative to the size of the economy has stayed nearly flat for decades regardless of which party controlled the White House or Congress. In fact, government spending has even dipped slightly during Democratic administrations. What the media portrays as a fight about the size of government is really a fight about priorities.
3. There's a consensus in this country that we want Big Government. When people say the government is too big, they are merely referring to the parts of government they don't like. Conservatives actually spend like drunken sailors when they hold the purse strings and couldn't care less about the deficit or the national debt. The difference is that conservatives will also starve the government of revenue, leading to huge deficits.
4. The idea that lowering taxes leads to greater revenue is an idea that persists despite having long since been debunked by actual economists. Conservative media outlets have an editorial line about the so-called "Laffer Curve" that writers are not allowed to cross. But the truth is, even people who are firmly in the conservative camp acknowledge that at US levels of taxation, the Laffer Curve doesn't apply and that lowering taxes will never lead to more government revenue.
5. There are numerous factors leading to the decline of upward economic mobility in the US, starting with an extremely weak educational system. The wealth of your parents has now become the single greatest statistical predictor of how you will do in life. It's becoming harder than ever to get ahead due to the elimination of paths to the middle and upper classes that used to exist and exist no longer.
6. The standard conservative line that the mortgage meltdown was caused by poor people taking out loans they couldn't afford because the government mandated that the banks grant such loans is a complete fabrication. There are no government mandates to make unhealthy loans and there never have been. Bad loans were made because they were the poker chips needed for the casino gamblers on Wall Street to run a variety of scams on the American people, knowing that if trouble hit, they could merely cry "too big to fail" and get bailed out by Uncle Sam.
7. The financial sector itself is a bloated and inefficient part of the economy. Furthermore, it provides no direct benefit in and of itself. It's only benefit is providing the support that allows actual commerce to take place -- in other words, finance is what economists call an "intermediate good". Much like trucking, for example. It is this bloated and inefficient sector of the economy that provides an intermediate good that was deemed "too big to fail". Think about that one for a moment.
8. Much of the evils in the rest of corporate America can be traced directly back to the financial sector. When the media says that "the markets" see things this way or that way, all they mean is the opinions of the economic elites who hold stocks on whether they are getting a good short-term return on their investment. Fail to meet the numbers and your company's stock is pounded. Thus, the financial sector, instead of serving the rest of the economy, has taken control of the rest of the economy. Corporate CEOs are pressured to do things that actually harm their own companies -- to say nothing of the rest of society -- to meet quarterly earnings expectations.