Hoisted from Others' Archives: James Kwak: Who’s a Freeloader?
Who’s a Freeloader?: "Daniel Rodgers’s review [of Williamson et l.]... is titled “‘Moocher Class’ Warfare”...
...Tea Party members like Medicare and Social Security, which they think they have earned through their work, but don’t like perceived freeloaders who live off of other peoples’ work. From the [Williamson et al.] paper (p. 33):
The distinction between “workers” and “people who don’t work” is fundamental to Tea Party ideology on the ground. First and foremost, Tea Party activists identify themselves as productive citizens... in opposition to nonworkers seen as profiting from government support for whom Tea Party adherents see themselves as footing the bill.... Tea Party anger is stoked by perceived redistributions—and the threat of future redistributions—from the deserving to the undeserving. Government programs are not intrinsically objectionable in the minds of Tea Party activists, and certainly not when they go to help them. Rather, government spending is seen as corrupted by creating benefits for people who do not contribute, who take handouts at the expense of hard-working Americans....
Leave aside the self-serving nature.... Does it even make any sense?... Alice works from twenty-five to fifty-five making $30,000 per year, more than double the minimum wage. Then she loses her job and goes on Medicaid--a classic “welfare” program.... Beatrice... works from twenty-five to sixty-five making $30,000 per year.... Then she retires and goes on Medicare.... Who’s the freeloader?
From the perspective of net benefits, they are both freeloaders.... On an annual basis, it seems like Medicare beneficiaries are freeloading even more than Medicaid beneficiaries, primarily because Medicare is more generous and because Medicare beneficiaries are older and hence consume more health care.... If you follow the money, almost everyone is a freeloader.... But from my perspective, neither Alice nor Beatrice is a freeloader. The right way to look at Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, in my opinion, is as insurance... against risks that may not materialize until decades in the future... death of a spouse, poor health, health care inflation, etc.... Americans like the things that government spends money on, but they claim not to like government, which leads to our current political mess...
