Americans Believe Gov't Does too Much-What Do You Think?
Proving once again that despite the results of the 2008 presidential election, Americans still believe in limited government principles, Gallup released a survey today showing that 57% of Americans say the government is trying to do too many things that should be left to businesses and individuals. Gallup notes:
The 57% level of public concern about big government in this survey is, among other things, coincident with an extensively increased government involvement in the economy, and the extensive focus on a large-scale government effort to reform health care that was underway as this survey was being conducted.
Gallup also found that 45% of Americans say there is too much government regulation of business compared to just 24% of Americans who say there is too little. Gallup adds:
As seen in the accompanying graph, the 45% “too much” reading is the highest of the decade and is higher than the one Gallup reading prior to this decade, in March 1993. However, a March 1981 Los Angeles Times poll using this question wording recorded a 54% “too much” level. This was just after Ronald Reagan took office, and may have reflected Reagan’s emphasis during the 1980 presidential campaign on the need to reduce government involvement in American society.
And these numbers are before the Obama adminstration and Congress force every American to buy health insurance, a mandate that President Obama HHS nominee Dr. Sherry Glied said “may require a degree of intrusiveness and bureaucracy that some will find unpalatable.” Indeed, the Baucus plan would:
require individuals, health insurers, employers, and government health agencies to report detailed health insurance information on all Americans to the IRS, adding significant administrative costs and reducing privacy protections. The IRS would also be required to report personal income data to state exchanges, insurance companies, and employers, because premium credits and out-of-pocket limits would depend on income.
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While most people always answer that they support Limited Government, we find that if you break it down issue by issue - that's not the case at all. It's a case of people buying into rhetoric.
Support for Universal Health Care (Medicare for all)
July 2009 Kaiser Poll: 58%
Feb 2009 NYT Poll: 59%
Feb 2009 Groves Poll: 59%
Medicare:
June 2009 Pew Research poll says 53% would increase government spending on Medicare, 37% would remain the same, and a pathetic 6% would decrease spending.
College Aid / Pell Grants:
Student Aid Alliance poll found 91% support federal programs to help college kids and 56% think they are underfunded (Student Aid Alliance Poll).
Social Security:
While we are fairly divided in most polls on Social Security I have a feeling this is more a result of political rhetoric similar to the limited government question. Why? CBS / NYT poll found 80% felt the government should provide a decent standard of living for the elderly. 63% favor taxing above the first $90,000 to promote the long-term health of social security . Weird huh. People are divided on SS, but it seems an overwhelming majority want government to provide for seniors and a healthy majority want more taxes on income past $90,000 to insure it's fiscal health. So much for being against "Social Security" programs.
Education:
July 2009 Pew Research poll finds 57% would favor spending more on education instead of reducing the deficit.
Housing:
66% would either strongly support or support increased federal spending on public housing (Chicago Tribune). Also, a plain 46% / 46% split in a Pew Research poll over whether government should have "bailed out" homeowners facing foreclosures (March 2009). So, a split on bailing out homeowners and big support for expanding public housing. Weird.
Free Market / Regulation:
A free market economy needs government regulation to serve the public best ... 62% mostly or completely agree. Only 29% mostly of completely disagree. Odd.
Transportation:
Do the people approve or disapprove government spending billions on bridges, roads, and other work projects? 73% said yes.
I can go on and on and on. It is clear that political rhetoric makes people say "yeah, limited government yeah!"; but poll after poll on specific issues will illustrate just what an illusion that is. You can't support so many of the things I describe above and still support limited government.
People need to learn that they cant always have their cake and eat too, especially when it is for the greater good of all parties involved. People need to learn how to sacrifice some things every now and then that society and specifically things that marketing campaigns say that we "need".
We spend too much time demanding our "freedom" only to turn around and expect that the government bail us out every time we make a mistake. We also frequently tend to act as though everything we want should be provided for by someone else. Mostly what we need to consider is that any aspect of our lives we allow the government into will become a political battleground where there will be no peace or objectivity...only rhetoric.
An even bigger problem in American regarding federal programs is that many Americans (as shown in my comment above) want the expansion, improvement, or creation of program after program. Yet, simultaneously, many Americans want reduced federal and state taxes . You run into a serious problem when Americans demand tax cuts and rebuke the notion of significantly raising taxes - yet they demand more programs. You run into a massive fiscal problem, which is why a lot of federal and state programs are suffering or will be suffering from deficits in the near future.
Nothing comes for free and these programs cannot continue to expand as so many Americans want them too (despite supporting "limited government"); but yet refuse to let taxes be raised on them. Politicians try to appease the people so they either: increase programs and cut taxes (Republicans), or they increase programs even more-so and only raise taxes marginally by comparison to spending (Democrats).
You run into an obvious problem.
What Americans (and many other nations btw) need to realize is if you want the welfare state, you have to pay the welfare state taxes. Sweden has a large number of marvelous, efficient, well-run welfare program - but the Swedish realize you pay up if you want that.
You make a good point though you leave out a key problem. The majority of people who want lower taxes tend to pay their own way and are not in favor of an expansion of government programs. On the other hand those who do not pay taxes or pay very little tend to come up short and feel they should have access to a greater variety of government provided services. So those who want more programs can't necessarily afford to fund them.
In the case of Sweden like some other Scandanavian countries has a very unique situation that allows it to make programs government funded programs work. First they are a relatively homogenous population which plays a role. More importantly, it has a relatively high percentage of it's population in the upper middle and upper income brackets. This allows them to feel that everyone is paying in more or less equally and having things centralized at the government level is more a matter of convenience.
One of the most important concepts Americans need to understand is that we too are in a unique situation. Simply stating that we are an "industrialized" nation only ties us very loosely to others falling under that label. Pointing to other countries and saying we need to do that here is in many ways just perpetuating a "grass is greener" mentality. If we are going to come up with solutions we need to start by getting a better sense of our own country rather than attempting to apply policies that work under entirely different circumstances.
I disagree with your assessment that the majority of people who "pay their own way" (I assume you mean those in higher income brackets who benefit less from the programs) are against the expansion of government programs. That's nearly an impossible claim given the huge numbers of people supporting Medicare (and a majority even expansion); the huge support for providing a basic standard living for the elderly; expanding college grants; expanding public housing ; the expansion of Food Stamps programs etc etc etc. There at least has to be a significant number of people in the group you are referring to as "paying their own way" that both want tax cuts and increased government programs. This is just based on the numbers, there isn't really a way around it, it's statistically impossible there isn't significant overlap.
I think what you are referring to more-so is this hypothetical group of people often don't favor expanding welfare programs designed to aid the impoverished substantially (public housing, food stamps, Medicaid); but it's statistically impossible they don't support more education spending, more Medicare spending, a form of social security ; etc etc. They just want programs that directly benefit them. Even if the stats throw out everyone making under $60,000 (or even $100,000 + ) - you'd still show up with a huge majority supporting expansion of government (at least issue by issue, rather than a blanket : do you support limited government? questions) and tax cuts at the same time.
I just don't think your assessment is supported by the stats. I'm not arguing that a decent minority simultaneously support tax cuts and the elimination / reduction of programs; but the numbers clearly show they are nothing more than just a decently sized minority when compared to the rest of the population - even when throwing out the people who are the benefactors of these programs. The numbers tell the case.
On your 2nd conclusion.
Homogeneity has nothing to do with the efficiency of the programs. A public housing program run by a homogenous group is not going to inherently be more effective and better than one run by a non-homogenous group. That doesn't make sense. It makes the efficiency and huge spending more political viable, but from a management and funding perspective it has little consequence.
On the note of income. Sweden, while not the most prosperous of countries by any extent, has an incredibly low Gini coefficient (measure of distribution of income), which means everyone is roughly of equal income there. You alluded to that, but what you fail to recognize is that tracing the Swedish economic history the reason this is so is BECAUSE of the welfare programs and very progressive taxation. If the US wanted to redistribute income like Sweden and it was political viable, we could have a country with roughly equal income distribution within the next decade if we expanded our welfare programs and get the exact scenario you are describing. Equality in income distribution occurs because of welfare states and so it stands to reason that this has nothing to do with the efficacy of the welfare program since it was putting them in place that created the situation.
On your note about mimicking other industrialized countries, it's honestly a case by case issue (for the record, I personally don't want a Swedish welfare state). Countries that are similar to us can provide insightful models and we can tweak them to fit us and that's what we should do. Like education is awful in the US, we should certainly as least consider and tweak models used by places like Finland or Hong Kong. I really don't buy that ethnic homogeneity matters, economic homogeneity is the only factor in program efficiency and political viability, in my opinion. Looking at Hong Kong, there is greater inequality there than in the US so they are a great starting point for an education model for us. It's a case by case situation.
I forgot to add that you are right about the income in Sweden. I was in a rush to comment and had not thought it through as well as I had imagined.
Few things are statistically impossible though I will give you that my illustration was oversimplified. I completelty agree there is an significant overlap, but it depend on indiviual programs. Furthermore, in reagard to education people are beginning to become skeptical of the "throw more money at it" approach. I would also say that the tea party movement is a good example of the people to which I was referring.
Once again, I was in a hurry to comment. I never intended that the homogeniety was ethnic and it's possible that I could have chosen a better word. What I was describing is the tendency for there to be so many conflicting political interest groups in the U.S. and so many who agree, but then fight over a solution, that it greatly inhibits the overall efficacy of a program.
Taking Sweden for example, when they decided to change their road system around it was generally accepted despite the fact that people voted against it. Here the debate would drag out for years.If they did manage to change it, various states would drag their feet or divert funding. By the time things are completed the end result would be a far cry from the initial intent.
This was what I was attempting to point out, homogeniety in political sense. A public housing project or other goverment progam certainly suffers a great deal from competing political ideologies jerking it back and forth. It has solid funding with one administration and then almost none with the next.
Why does the government take our money just to give it back to us with strings attached? Why not just let us keep our money?
Maybe they are charging us for our complacency on everything else would be one way of looking at it.