There are elements of what you say that might be true. A lot of people who experience success also experience guilt that they're doing better than others. A lot of super-rich see what they have and feel guilty they have so much. That's natural. What they ought to do in that case is to give of themselves to others, rather than having government force others to give of themselves against their will. I, for one, give quite a lot to various charities. But it's MY choice to give to those charities, not because I am being forced to give.
But Frum does make a lot of bad assumptions. For instance, the poor don't always get poorer. In the Bush Administration, we've had some hard economic times due to many factors like external attacks or natural disasters in which case the poor always do worse since the richer people usually have fallback positions or nest eggs. And you cannot prove that supply-side economics cause bad times when the Reagan Administration is clear proof that it doesn't. Reaganomics dragged us out of the horrid Carter era of tax and spend economics.
As for the poor, the one fallacy that no one ever takes into account is upward mobility, which is the easiest to do in this country. In most countries around the world, people do not easily change income groups. In the United States, it's routine. The statistics do not tell you that the poor of last year are the same as the poor of this year.
In the Reagan Administration, for example, minority families gained a lot with many poor moving out of their economic status into higher income groups. Other poor will always be there to take their place, like teenagers and kids coming out of college or illegal immigrants. Everybody has to start somewhere, you know.
The statistics also fail to take into account the vast amounts of illegal immigration in this country. The illegals are factored into the income groups, but are generally locked into the poorest of the poor because it is technically illegal for them to work in this country.
I would love to see a study that takes those factors into account: upward mobility and illegal immigration.
A second fallacy is that inequity is a bad thing. John F. Kennedy once said about tax cuts that, "a rising tide lifts all boats." As long as everybody gets more money, has the opportunity to move into higher income groups, there is nothing wrong with inequality. Economics teaches about the old equity versus efficiency argument. Equality is always gained at the loss of efficiency, and vice versa. If the income gains are higher at the top, who cares as long as everybody gets a bigger piece of a growing pie? I certainly don't envy the millionaire next door who runs his business, employs hundreds of jobs, and does very well for himself and his family. If he or she worked hard to get their wealth, they deserve to enjoy the fruits of their labor.
America's poor are actually fairly well off compared to much of the world. Our poor have places to go home to, TV's, cars, air conditioning, microwave ovens, etc.
Those who care more about equity sacrifice efficiency. That's why Americans are better off, economically, than every other country in the world. That's why everybody's flocking to come here and not to Mexico or China. People instinctively understand that if the opportunities are there, they will do well for themselves if they put forth the effort and have a little bit of luck on their side. In other countries, the opportunities just aren't there. Or there is no incentive to go anywhere.
Here, jobs are generally at-will, which means an employer can terminate an employee for virtually any reason except for discrimination. Many who lose their jobs often find better jobs or even find the incentive to run their own business. I see success stories like that all the time. In Europe, for example where people are more concerned with equity than efficiency, it's virtually impossible to fire anyone. So not only do employers resist hiring employees leading to chronic high unemployment, but no one has an incentive to go out and do better for themselves.
There's a very good reason the US dollar is rising these days. People have finally figured out that even in the midst of a financial crisis, American businesses and even banks are better off than those elsewhere. The Euro and pound are being beaten down now because people have realized Europe is worse off than we are, and not just because of the American financial crisis. We've also had pretty good growth for quite a while while Europe stagnates permanently under its welfare programs.
As an aside, I was in Sweden just this last August where the dollar was trading at barely 6 kronor/dollar and even briefly dipped into the fives. Today, the dollar is trading at 7.8992 kronor/dollar, the highest it's been since I started going to Sweden almost annually fifteen years ago. That shows the resiliency of the American economy.
These reasons are why people want to come to America. Not because outcome is equal in all cases. No one can guarantee equal outcome. But equal opportunity can be guaranteed to the best of our abilities. Equal opportunity is the key to having everyone be better off, not equal outcome, which is impossible.
