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Conservatives like to tell us government should be run like our family household. Government, they say, should live within its means, presumably like your family and mine. In their Norman Rockwell vision of the world, Mom manages the household budget and spends no more than Dad makes. Let us put aside for the moment the fact our world has become more complex than Rockwell ever imagined in his small-town America and, using the conservative analogy, see how it holds up.
In their analogy, our household budget is the federal budget. When our expenses go up, we are faced with several alternatives — find areas where we can reduce costs or cut them out entirely; search for a way to increase our income; or cut our expenses and increase our income.
In the conservative universe, you have only one choice: Cut expenses (the government budget). Remember, in this analogy, increasing household income would be tantamount to raising taxes.
Carrying the analogy further, Mom and Dad scrupulously go through their budget item by item. They can’t do anything about the necessities, in terms of the federal budget, these are entitlement programs that even the Tea Party embraces (Don’t touch my Medicare). Mom and Dad reduce their utility bills marginally by making sure they turn off the lights, TV and radio when they leave the room. They lower the thermostat in winter and raise it in summer. They insulate the house and fix leaky faucets, all of which reduce costs in the long-term, but require a short-term investment. Much to their chagrin, they find, after reducing their expenses, they still can’t meet the rising cost of living. Even the reduction in their use of utilities didn’t save as much as they had figured because, although their usage went down, their rates went up.
Under the conservative model, Mom and Dad are not allowed to increase revenue (taxes). They have no alternative but to begin eliminating items once considered necessities — no more vacations, no more eating out once in awhile, no allowances for the kids, etc. Eventually costs still outstrip household income and soon Mom and Dad find they can’t pay the mortgage, and the premiums for their medical coverage. They can only partially pay their bills or not at all. Life quickly becomes impossible.
This is exactly what we are beginning to see at the level of state and local governments where teachers and cops are laid off, firehouses are closed on a rotating basis, and our infrastructure is crumbling as government struggles to maintain roads and bridges and Hawaii is on a four-day school week to save money.
In reality, Mom and Dad would find ways to increase their household income before they would allow their family life to deteriorate. Dad might volunteer for overtime or take a part-time job. Mom would go out to work. The kids would get after-school or weekend jobs delivering newspapers or mowing lawns. The American family is pragmatic, not conservative ideologues. Mom and Dad understand there is more than one way to balance a budget; usually it takes a combination of reducing expenses and increasing revenue.
If Mom and Dad understand this basic approach to budgeting, why don’t conservatives? According to conservative Grover Norquist, they want to shrink government down to the size where they can drown it in a bathtub.
Despite all their populist blathering these days, conservatives don’t really believe in much of a safety net for the average American, as it just makes Americans soft. While you won’t hear them say as much in public, it is easy enough to read between the lines. The conservative congressional guru on the budget is Paul Ryan (R-Minn.) who believes Social Security should be privatized.
George W. Bush once floated this idea until the stock market went south along with your 401(k). Ryan also wants to turn Medicare, the most popular government program and the favorite of Tea Party members (although many of them don’t realize Medicare is a government program), into a voucher system, which studies have shown would increase costs and reduce coverage. The much-praised New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie had no problem asking teachers to accept pay cuts, but cringed when it came to increase the tax salaries above $400,000. Republican nominee for governor, Tom Corbett, has bad-mouthed unemployment compensation.
In truth, while mouthing platitudes about big government living within its means, many of these same conservatives turned a blind eye toward budget deficits when they ran the White House and Congress during the last administration.
The conservative vision of America would leave your family eking out a meager existence. It includes crumbling highways, deteriorating schools and a health-care system that only benefits insurance companies. Without today’s Social Security, Medicare and adequate unemployment compensation, Rockwell’s America would be more like the America of Herbert Hoover. SPR
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