September 17, 2012
Posted by Jay Livingston
Bloggiversary. A year ends, a year begins. For the blog, this will be year 7 - a far cry from 5773, I know, but six years still seems like a long time. I’m sure there was much to atone for, but that comes later. Meanwhile, here are ten posts from the past year that I liked.
1. Nov. 7 Patriotism Goes to the Movies
2. Nov. 17 Constructing Character
3. Dec. 5 Economics and Ethos
4. Jan. 3 Myths That Move Us (and That Bus)
5. Jan 17 Civil Rights and American Conservatism
6. March 16 Accidental Banksters
7. June 2 Blaming the Media I
8. June 30 Standing Your Ground in the Wild West
9. July 10 Bitter Tea
10. August 9 Charting the Climb
Conservative Morality in Benghazi
September 13, 2012
Posted by Jay Livingston
The nice thing about having several principles in your moral toolkit is that you have more ways to justify acts that some other people might find unsupportable – things like torture and assassination.
Jonathan Haidt has become famous for saying that liberals have a narrower set of moral principles than do conservatives. Liberals base moral judgments on just two principles:
First reports from Libya assumed that the killers were motivated by anger over a video that made fun of Mohammed the Prophet. Now it appears the attack was not so spontaneous.
Western observers often characterize the angry Muslims as “medieval.” If Libya and other countries were modern, goes this reasoning, these medieval reactions – the fatwas and the assassinations of cartoonists, homosexuals, rape victims, and others – would be confined to a retrograde fringe. But the social bases of this morality span a slightly broader period than the dark ages. Conservative morality seems to be an aspect of agricultural society – going back 10-15,000 years. In the hundreds of thousands of years before then, hunter-gatherers placed less emphasis purity, authority, and loyalty. These conservative principles also have a diminished role in “modern,” i.e., industrial, societies of the last 300 years.
But the overlap of economy and morality is far from perfect. Even in a thoroughly industrial or even post-industrial society, segments of the population may support torture or the blanket exclusion of outsiders (currently Muslims). As Haidt’s studies – done mostly in the US – show, medieval morality can hang on long after the economic basis of society has changed.
Posted by Jay Livingston
The nice thing about having several principles in your moral toolkit is that you have more ways to justify acts that some other people might find unsupportable – things like torture and assassination.
Jonathan Haidt has become famous for saying that liberals have a narrower set of moral principles than do conservatives. Liberals base moral judgments on just two principles:
- Harm / Care
- Fairness / Reciprocity
- Ingroup/ Loyalty
- Authority/ Respect
- Purity/ Sanctity
First reports from Libya assumed that the killers were motivated by anger over a video that made fun of Mohammed the Prophet. Now it appears the attack was not so spontaneous.
Officials said it was possible that an organized group had either been waiting for an opportunity to exploit like the protests over the video or perhaps even generated the protests as a cover for their attack. [NYT]Whatever their motivations, the assassins apparently knew that the bloodshed would get popular support, support based on conservative morality. The attack epitomized loyalty to the ingroup (Islam). The video was an act of grave disrespect, so avenging it upheld the authority of the faith. The video was also violation of rules of purity surrounding the sacred elements of Islam. According to principles in the conservative moral toolkit, avenging the American-made video by killing Americans was a very moral act.
Western observers often characterize the angry Muslims as “medieval.” If Libya and other countries were modern, goes this reasoning, these medieval reactions – the fatwas and the assassinations of cartoonists, homosexuals, rape victims, and others – would be confined to a retrograde fringe. But the social bases of this morality span a slightly broader period than the dark ages. Conservative morality seems to be an aspect of agricultural society – going back 10-15,000 years. In the hundreds of thousands of years before then, hunter-gatherers placed less emphasis purity, authority, and loyalty. These conservative principles also have a diminished role in “modern,” i.e., industrial, societies of the last 300 years.
But the overlap of economy and morality is far from perfect. Even in a thoroughly industrial or even post-industrial society, segments of the population may support torture or the blanket exclusion of outsiders (currently Muslims). As Haidt’s studies – done mostly in the US – show, medieval morality can hang on long after the economic basis of society has changed.
Loopholes
September 12, 2012
Posted by Jay Livingston
Romney has promised broad tax cuts and a reduction in the deficit. But the only way you can reduce tax rates for everyone and maintain the same amount of tax coming in is to close tax “loopholes.” Which is what Romney said he would do. The only trouble is that when it comes to which loopholes, he’s keeping that a secret. (When it comes to specifics about taxes, Romney apparently has a don’t-tell policy.)
If Romney wanted to identify a few loopholes, he’d have a very wide choice. The tax code is huge and complicated, and it is full of tax breaks. The Washington Post recently posted this interactive graphic that allows you to mouse through the mountain of tax expenditures* and see when each was created, how much it costs the government, and whether the money benefits mostly to individuals or to companies.
Here’s a screen shot.
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* Some people have a hard time understanding the idea of “tax expenditure” especially at the individual level. But from the perspective of the bottom line, it should be clear that forgoing money by not collecting a billion dollars in taxes has the same effect on the deficit as spending a billion dollars.
Posted by Jay Livingston
Romney has promised broad tax cuts and a reduction in the deficit. But the only way you can reduce tax rates for everyone and maintain the same amount of tax coming in is to close tax “loopholes.” Which is what Romney said he would do. The only trouble is that when it comes to which loopholes, he’s keeping that a secret. (When it comes to specifics about taxes, Romney apparently has a don’t-tell policy.)
If Romney wanted to identify a few loopholes, he’d have a very wide choice. The tax code is huge and complicated, and it is full of tax breaks. The Washington Post recently posted this interactive graphic that allows you to mouse through the mountain of tax expenditures* and see when each was created, how much it costs the government, and whether the money benefits mostly to individuals or to companies.
Here’s a screen shot.
(Click on the image for a larger, clearer view. Better yet, go to the WaPo Website.)
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* Some people have a hard time understanding the idea of “tax expenditure” especially at the individual level. But from the perspective of the bottom line, it should be clear that forgoing money by not collecting a billion dollars in taxes has the same effect on the deficit as spending a billion dollars.
Reducing Poverty
September 11, 2012
Posted by Jay Livingston
The poverty rate in the US in the mid-2000s was about 17%. In Sweden, the poverty rates was 5.3%; in Germany, 11%. That was the rate after adding in government transfers. In Germany, the poverty rate before those transfers was 33.6%, ten points higher than that in the US. Sweden’s pre-transfer poverty rate was about the same as ours.
Jared Bernstein has this chart showing pre-transfer and post-transfer rates for the OECD countries.
Three points:
1. Governments have the power to reduce poverty, and reduce it a lot. European governments do far more towards this goal than does the US government.
2. It’s unlikely that America’s poor people are twice as lazy or unskilled or dissolute as their European counterparts. Individual factors may explain differences between individuals, but these explanations have little relevance for the problem of overall poverty. The focus on individual qualities also has little use as a basis for policy. European countries have fewer people living in poverty, but not because those countries exhort the poor to lead more virtuous lives and punish them for their improvident ways. European countries have lower poverty rates because the governments provide money and services to those who need them.
3. The amount of welfare governments provide does not appear to have a dampening effect on the overall economy.
Posted by Jay Livingston
The poverty rate in the US in the mid-2000s was about 17%. In Sweden, the poverty rates was 5.3%; in Germany, 11%. That was the rate after adding in government transfers. In Germany, the poverty rate before those transfers was 33.6%, ten points higher than that in the US. Sweden’s pre-transfer poverty rate was about the same as ours.
Jared Bernstein has this chart showing pre-transfer and post-transfer rates for the OECD countries.
(Click on the chart for a larger view. Or see it at Jared Bernstein's blog.)
Three points:
1. Governments have the power to reduce poverty, and reduce it a lot. European governments do far more towards this goal than does the US government.
2. It’s unlikely that America’s poor people are twice as lazy or unskilled or dissolute as their European counterparts. Individual factors may explain differences between individuals, but these explanations have little relevance for the problem of overall poverty. The focus on individual qualities also has little use as a basis for policy. European countries have fewer people living in poverty, but not because those countries exhort the poor to lead more virtuous lives and punish them for their improvident ways. European countries have lower poverty rates because the governments provide money and services to those who need them.
3. The amount of welfare governments provide does not appear to have a dampening effect on the overall economy.
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