Post by Admin on Jul 24, 2021 13:48:00 GMT -6
Originally posted on FaceBook Jan 8, 2021 - moved here July 24,2021
TL;DR added here July 24, 2021 - What I mean when I say that the Summer rioters and the Capitol Stormers are not that far apart is all they really want is the means to actually succeed when they put forth the effort to do so and not to be hindered by government at every turn. So yes, the grievances of the two sides that seem to be so far apart are not actually all that different. We have just been divided by rhetoric and convinced that the person on the other side of the argument is the enemy rather than the puppeteers that are stirring us into a frenzy for their own amusement and for their own gains.
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Books can, and probably will, be written on this subject, but I’ll suffice with this.
I say that the grievances of the rioters from the Summer of 2020 and those from the Capitol in January 2021 are not that far apart. How do I justify that?
First, I will not assume that I know the full plight of people of color in America. The largest organizations associated with the Summer riots were Black Lives Matter (BLM) and Antifa. I will not enter into a debate around Antifa, unless specifically asked to, so let’s focus on BLM. BLM was founded around the tragedy of Trayvon Martin and in more recent years has done its best to shed light on the practices of elevated violence by authority figures on people of color in the population. BLM further reverse engineers the assumption that since the enforcement arms of authority are so radically aligned against people of color that the entire system of authority must be based in racism, thus BLM is on the front lines of the fight against systemic racism and law enforcement overreach.
When you look at the laws that have been passed, honestly it is hard to argue against many of their points. No-knock warrants, qualified immunity, civil forfeiture, mandatory minimums, criminalization of victimless crimes, the war on drugs, the war on crime . . . all of these policies (passed in bi-partisan unity at the federal, state and municipal levels) tend to affect the lower income people in the US at a greater rate than the higher income people . . . wherever you draw that line. If you focus outside of the actual “death by police” part of the agenda that grabs the most headlines, BLM has a very good point. The policies that are in place are blatantly affecting low income communities at a higher rate and the demographics show that those communities have a higher percentage of people of color.
So, law enforcement policies obviously target lower income persons, but this is America, why can’t people that start in lower income communities make their way out of it? There are examples. One of the senators recently elected in GA had a grandmother who picked cotton for a living for a while. That’s a major elevation of income level over 2 generations. Why isn’t it more common?
Once again we have to look at the policies in place. If someone finds themselves in a low income situation and assuming they do not have a crippling situation with health (mental or physical), addiction or family, then there are pathways out of that situation.
The first is to simply start working and get experience and build a job into a career as best you can. What are the barriers to entry to this situation? The minimum wage is a barrier to entry to this. All of our economy is based on supply/demand and the costs of goods and services. If you are looking for work, you are willing to provide services for pay. The employer values those services at a certain level and you value your time and work at a certain level. If you two can come to an agreement on those values, then you are hired and the job begins. Outside of that objective value view, there is an actual value being exchanged. If the company employing you is paying you $10/hr and you are providing $7/hr of value, are you likely to be able to keep that job or not? It depends on how much surplus value the business is generating, whether your value is improving over time and whether your manager/employer recognizes these facts. If the value supplied by the employees is much lower than the labor costs of the business, that business is destined for failure. This applies no matter your background.
There is room within this system for improvement and training and several other things. There is also room for bad managers/employers and good managers/employers. Over time, the bad ones will fail and the good ones will succeed more often than not. The minimum wage sets the lower level of where an employer is willing to take a chance on someone for a job. In giving them responsibilities necessary to the success of the business, the employer is taking a chance of failure in hiring that person and a chance of success leading to surplus value. Failure can doom the entire business and success can be shared among the employees. Good and bad mangers/employers are built in the gray areas here.
The higher the minimum wage is, the less risk the employer is able to take on an employee. So, while those employed will enjoy a better situation, the overall number employed will decrease. Supply and demand. This is a barrier for those in low income situations looking to improve and get out of those situations. If there was no minimum wage, then everyone could come to an agreement to work and improve their experience and skillset and begin working their way up the ladder.
Another barrier to this is the welfare cliff. When low income people are getting assistance from the government that is based on their income, there is no incentive get experience and gain skills that will move them beyond those income levels because when they do, there is an actual DECREASE in total income when the government benefits are taken away over a relatively small increase in personal income. Unless an individual or family can somehow leap over a large income gap (which varies from state to state) it makes no sense for them to even try because in the “in between” portions, their financial situation will be even worse than the government-assisted poverty they are already living in. Both the minimum wage and government assistance programs are wide ranging, bi-partisan policies that were passed with much lauded fanfare about the good that they will do.
Secondly, rather than becoming an employee, those in low income situations may choose to start a business given some skill that they already possess. Meal prep, plumbing, carpentry, construction, lawn care, taxi service . . . at this point I will focus on business type items as those special individuals with artistic or athletic talent are a whole different story. What are the barriers to entry for these businesses? Let’s take taxi service as an example. What do you need to be a taxi service? A car and yourself and some knowledge of the area you are going to operate in or a really good navigation app, right? To do it LEGALLY, you will also need a driver’s license, insurance (which may need to be enhanced insurance if you are planning on having paying passengers regularly), car registration and safety inspection at a minimum. Ok, that’s not too bad. If you can get enough fares, you can pay for all of that and still make a living and hopefully improve/expand over time with hard work. In Houston (a fairly unregulated Taxi market) you must also pass criminal background and fingerprint tests, pay for a special driver’s license, you are limited on which types of cars you can use and how old they can be, there are additional fees for taxi cab permits and company operator permits and the additional costs are around $2000/year just to meet city ordinances, this does not include costs that may be involved with getting the correct type and age of transportation to be able to start the business in the first place. Depending on how low your low-income situation is to begin with, any one of these barriers to entry may be enough to disqualify you on startup expenses or having to get a loan through the banking system, which would subject you to different levels of scrutiny and increase the costs of doing business for lower income individuals over higher income individuals. These relatively minor costs are to set up in Houston, which is not a huge taxi town . . . what about New York, Boston, Chicago, Philadelphia. Just a taxi medallion is those cities (permit to operate a single taxi) are $135,000; $40,000; $60,000; $50,000 respectively. Those are one-time costs, not yearly, but still prohibitive to low income people looking to improve their situations. There is no reason for these costs except that the number of medallions is intentionally kept scarce by the city governments in question. It should also be noted that ride-sharing apps have reduced the costs of each of these medallions by 50-90% since 2014, but that many airports and municipalities have tried to make Uber and Lyft illegal to use from their facilities. These are governments trying to keep their power in place and away from decentralized systems controlled by individuals.
The same is true at some level in ALL of the business ideas that I mentioned above. The amount of city, state and federal regulations to start a business of any kind drive the start-up costs so high that low-income individuals cannot afford it on their own and thus must apply to loans which, again comes with a whole different set of scrutiny and increased costs that are uniquely targeted at low-income individuals. This also does not even begin to address the tax burdens on business from the government digging into overall profits at some level.
What’s another way to get out from a low-income situation? Get an education of some sort and get a jump in income from a college degree or some specialized vocational training. What are the barriers to entry for these programs? Cost, entry requirements, time to complete are all barriers involved here. Cost issues are directly the fault of bi-partisan policies around government guaranteed student loans. Since there is no loss possibility for the schools they keep raising the costs to attend because people will continue to pay the costs to get the degrees and if they fail to pay it back, then the school still gets its money from the government though the student’s credit rating is ruined (which can make it even harder for them to get out of the low-income situation though they now have a degree or certification in place) and the cost is spread throughout the taxpayer base via deficit spending. Entry requirements may initially disqualify low-income individuals who may not have access to the level of education or other needs to qualify for certain programs in the first place. Time to complete the programs may also be of issue if the individual must complete the program while still earning a living, further complications may arise if any low-income grants or scholarships may be counted as income that would increase their limits beyond that of qualifying for government assistance . . . the welfare cliff strikes again!!
Ideally, the low-income individual is able to attend the program on scholarship, that does not disqualify them from other forms of government assistance they are counting on, can complete the program quickly and maintain their current (albeit low) standard of living while doing so. The education/training that they receive then will help them to leap over the welfare cliff and remove themselves from government assistance and see an ACTUAL increase in their standard of living as a result. That’s a lot of conditions needed for success with government getting in the way at every step.
So that’s the Summer rioters side of things. The law enforcement arm of the government disproportionately affects low income individuals due to policies in place and demographics mean that people of color are those most affected. Other policies in place also help to prevent those that are currently in low-income situations from getting themselves out of those situations at every possible avenue. This leads to a widespread belief in systemic racism, unrest and distrust of the government and authority at large. Unfortunately, there is also a, in my opinion, false belief that expansion of the exact programs that are providing obstacles to the advancement of low-income individuals will help them to get out of those situations. This is, again, my opinion, but I believe that it is backed up well by facts and a conservative (Austrian) view of economics.
So, having said all of that . . . how can I still say that Trump supporters aren’t that different? Remember, a LOT of Trump supporters are lower, lower middle, middle class blue collar type workers who if they aren’t actually low-income individuals, they aren’t very far from being so. Everything that applies above applies to them too. Though many are out of government assistance and doing all they can to continue to climb the rungs of the ladder. This is an oddly aligned group, they have some issues equal with the Summer rioters, but they have some issues with the next group of people as well.
The other side of the Trump coin are those that are definitely beyond the labels of low-income individuals, but they have a lot of the same complaints as their middle class counterparts. Their complaints are mostly economic. Why are my taxes so high? Where do those expenses go? Why are we sending so much foreign aid with so many problems at home? Drain the swamp!! We’ve heard these slogans and arguments over and over. While many of them are coming from a point of self-focus and doing their best to keep what they feel they have earned with their time and effort, in truth, the things that they are against are the same things that the Summer rioters and BLM are against. The government has failed us all, is pitting us against one another and continuing to grow no matter which side wins elections.
If Ds win, the Summer rioters are happy and the Trump supporters are unhappy. On the surface, they seem wholly divided and at odds on every level. The Summer rioters want expanded minimum wages, expanded welfare programs, weaker policing laws and wider tax bases for high income individuals. The Trump supporters are angry that their taxes may go up and be used for these expanded programs and we argue around and around about what is happening.
What actually happens? Taxes may rise some, but the end result is government spending beyond the tax base, no matter what it is. How does this affect every individual in the country? Higher-income people are unhappy because they have to pay more in taxes so they have to figure out a way to make up those losses or decrease their standard of living. Count on ALL people to ALWAYS want to keep or improve their standard of living, no matter what that is. So, the taxes among the high-income individuals are passed on through their businesses to the low and middle income individuals in the form of higher prices on whatever they are selling. Additionally, even with the expanded tax base, there is no limit on spending and the deficit increases. Since we are monetizing the debt through the Federal Reserve at this time that means that the dollar begins to weaken as many more of them go into circulation. Factoid – in 2020 we increased the number of total dollars circulating in the economy of the world by more than 20%. That means that each individual dollar has less buying power as time marches on. Who does this disproportionately affect? Again . . . low-income individuals. Those are the people that are more likely to have only access to dollars by living paycheck-to-paycheck or having some modest savings. Those with investments and real property or assets will realize the ability to sell those assets for larger and larger amounts of dollars and be able to stay ahead of the inflation curve by doing so intelligently while those needing to buy milk and bread and gasoline directly from their weekly wages will see the prices of those go up while their paycheck remain the same. So even though the Summer rioters are happy with who won, the monetary policies that keep them as low-income in perpetuity are continued and expanded and they get all of the things that they ask for and the situation does not change. In the next election cycle, they are promised that it only didn’t work because “we didn’t go far enough” and “we are going to spend so much more to make things better for you!!” and the cycle continues.
If the Rs win, then the Trump supporters are happy and the Summer rioters are unhappy. The Trump supporters want lower taxes, to keep policing at the level it is, reduced government assistance benefits and more of the expenditures of the government staying in the US rather than going overseas. The Summer rioters are angry because systemic racism will continue to exist in the form of the policies discussed above, their standard of living may decrease depending on which state they live in and how many changes can be implemented and higher-income individuals will be keeping more of what they earn.
What actually happens? Taxes may go down some, but the government never cuts spending so the deficits continues to rise. All of the programs that are keeping low-income individuals are still in place, so they are still trapped where they are and all of the items that occur from monetizing the larger debt still hold in place. The only benefit is that since the deficits cannot grow as quickly due to a more limited tax base, the decline is not as swift. See the paragraph above about the effects of expanding the deficit and monetizing the debt through the Fed. All of this holds no matter who wins!! Rs will continue to win until enough of the higher-income individuals are convinced that they have to expand programs to help the low-income individuals get out of their situation or the number of lower-income individuals outnumber all other demographics and vote for their own benefits and the cycle continues.
That is what I mean when I say that the Summer rioters and the Capitol rioters are not that far apart. All they really want is the means to actually succeed when they put forth the effort to do so and not to be hindered by government at every turn. While I believe that there are some on each side motivated by less lofty ideals than that (racism/hatred/greed or wanting a free ride through life from the taxpayers) I do not believe they are in great numbers on either side.
The true issue is that the centralized federal government has gotten too big and has infiltrated every facet of our lives. So much so that the degree to which it affects every avenue of advancement for every individual is not blatantly obvious in every case anymore. We can all see that we are struggling on some level and we would all be better off if not for “this.” What “this” is may vary for every individual, but if you look at the root cause of “this” in every case it most likely comes from a regulation or requirement from a bloated government entity. We have been trained since the Great Depression to look more and more to government to be the solution to our problems. This worked well when the majority of people representing us in the government had honor, integrity and the good of the people and the country in their hearts. This is no longer the case, it is a rarity to find a true servant among politicians at the Federal and State levels. The sorts of people that gravitate to that level of power and influence are more likely to abuse it than to use it for the good of others. We as voters have gotten bad at discerning those that will serve us vs. those that will use us and it’s as simple as that.
So yes, the grievances of the two sides that seem to be so far apart are not actually all that different. We have just been divided by rhetoric and convinced that the person on the other side of the argument is the enemy rather than the puppeteers that are stirring us into a frenzy for their own amusement and for their own gains.
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Commenter #1 - So, in a nutshell, income makes the grievances the same? Your position makes more sense when it is anchored to that.
Me - Both sets of them have been failed by the long term and continuing policies of the government, unless you are part of the group that can actually afford to buy influence in Washington. Everyone else is chasing scraps and being held down on some if not all avenues.
Commenter #1 - Personally, I believe the impact of white supremacy / racism - going deeper and further in history than where I think you are starting the narrative- makes this fundamentally a different set of “grievances”. And I don’t agree that seeking to address this is a “less lofty ideal”, as you put it.
Editorial Note - the commenter misunderstood my representation of "less lofty ideals" - I was not saying that fighting racism was less lofty, I was saying that those motivated by racism/hatred/greed or wanting a free ride on the taxpayers were the less lofty ones. So I ignored that part of their comment when replying with the comment below.
Me - That makes for a different source to draw from, but what is seen as "systemic racism" is really just the same government policies that are in place and affecting all Americans. Lower income Americans are affected disproportionately by all of the policies no matter their intention. So yes, under the bootheel, it feels like systemic racism, but the truth is that the highest affected demographics just happen to include a higher percentage of people of color. The crony capitalism, corrupt, deficit spending group we have installed and allowed to set up laws and regulations that make it more likely for them to constantly recycle through would be grinding to dust whoever is on the bottom rungs and doing their best to expand the grinding up the ladder as far as they can! Further expansion and buy-in to the same old ideals pushing towards bigger government, more control and less freedom will perpetuate that. This next part is going to hurt, but hear me out. Trump did a lot wrong. Wanting to expand the police state, divisive rhetoric, expanding deficit spending, increasing tariffs and practically having a trade war, these are all policies that expand the government, or at least prevent cooperative dialog, but what did he do to shrink the government? He lowered taxes and removed a good deal of background regulation on businesses and the energy sector of the economy. What happened in that specific space? For regular, normal Americans, life got a whole lot better. Everyone was working, the price of gasoline and most things that were needed day-to-day were the lowest they have been in a long time and we actually over supplied the world with oil causing a price crash. That's bad for the energy industry, but great for many normal Americans. When did this good pathway stop? When the virus came to the forefront and policies once again turned to expanding government, expanding control, limiting freedoms and increasing government deficits. Then everything snowballed from there and we find ourselves having elected the big government poster children and installed them with unfettered control for at least 2 years. Do you think those that were disenfranchised under Trump's policies once he went back to expanding the government will do any better over the next 2-4 years? Or will they have the same issues come election time and be fed the same failed policies with a new coat of paint on them? To me it is blatantly obvious what few decisions Trump made that no other politician would make that worked. The rest of his agenda was complete BS, just like every other politico out there, so why can't we try electing people that believe in the pieces that had success (freedom, deregulation, shrinking influence and cutting taxes) and similar policies (cutting spending, balancing the budget and removing national debt) instead of lumping those few successes in with all of the bad, typical political decisions he made and throwing them all out for the status quo? If you look closely and with an open mind, you can see what worked and what didn't. The reason there is a set of people so loyal to him is because they focus on the few things he did that were good that no other politicians would have ever done. The reason there are so many against him are the way he went about his business, his lack of caring/understanding and all of the things he did badly like a regular politician. We need to focus on the results of the specific decisions made the last 4 years and not either be "all-in" or "all-out" on the person making them. We are smart enough to see what worked (a few things) and what didn't (most of the rest). It's obvious to me what they were and I'm trying to expand that viewpoint and get people to realize that we need more outsiders to break the R/D hold on the government. The outsider policies of Trump were successful when they stuck to libertarian values. Everything else was pandering and populist BS. Let's focus on the little bit of libertarianism we were shown, let Trump fade into the background and start to apply the one good thing he showed us works. When framed like this literally every good thing that happened and every bad thing that happened over the last 4 years can be explained. Was it a libertarian idea? Then it was mostly a good result. Did it go against libertarian ideas? Then it was probably a bad result, no matter the intentions. If you look at the unbiased results of policies, I think you will see this to be true. So, if we can easily separate successes and failures by applying a simple set of ideals, why not try those applications more widely?
TL;DR added here July 24, 2021 - What I mean when I say that the Summer rioters and the Capitol Stormers are not that far apart is all they really want is the means to actually succeed when they put forth the effort to do so and not to be hindered by government at every turn. So yes, the grievances of the two sides that seem to be so far apart are not actually all that different. We have just been divided by rhetoric and convinced that the person on the other side of the argument is the enemy rather than the puppeteers that are stirring us into a frenzy for their own amusement and for their own gains.
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Books can, and probably will, be written on this subject, but I’ll suffice with this.
I say that the grievances of the rioters from the Summer of 2020 and those from the Capitol in January 2021 are not that far apart. How do I justify that?
First, I will not assume that I know the full plight of people of color in America. The largest organizations associated with the Summer riots were Black Lives Matter (BLM) and Antifa. I will not enter into a debate around Antifa, unless specifically asked to, so let’s focus on BLM. BLM was founded around the tragedy of Trayvon Martin and in more recent years has done its best to shed light on the practices of elevated violence by authority figures on people of color in the population. BLM further reverse engineers the assumption that since the enforcement arms of authority are so radically aligned against people of color that the entire system of authority must be based in racism, thus BLM is on the front lines of the fight against systemic racism and law enforcement overreach.
When you look at the laws that have been passed, honestly it is hard to argue against many of their points. No-knock warrants, qualified immunity, civil forfeiture, mandatory minimums, criminalization of victimless crimes, the war on drugs, the war on crime . . . all of these policies (passed in bi-partisan unity at the federal, state and municipal levels) tend to affect the lower income people in the US at a greater rate than the higher income people . . . wherever you draw that line. If you focus outside of the actual “death by police” part of the agenda that grabs the most headlines, BLM has a very good point. The policies that are in place are blatantly affecting low income communities at a higher rate and the demographics show that those communities have a higher percentage of people of color.
So, law enforcement policies obviously target lower income persons, but this is America, why can’t people that start in lower income communities make their way out of it? There are examples. One of the senators recently elected in GA had a grandmother who picked cotton for a living for a while. That’s a major elevation of income level over 2 generations. Why isn’t it more common?
Once again we have to look at the policies in place. If someone finds themselves in a low income situation and assuming they do not have a crippling situation with health (mental or physical), addiction or family, then there are pathways out of that situation.
The first is to simply start working and get experience and build a job into a career as best you can. What are the barriers to entry to this situation? The minimum wage is a barrier to entry to this. All of our economy is based on supply/demand and the costs of goods and services. If you are looking for work, you are willing to provide services for pay. The employer values those services at a certain level and you value your time and work at a certain level. If you two can come to an agreement on those values, then you are hired and the job begins. Outside of that objective value view, there is an actual value being exchanged. If the company employing you is paying you $10/hr and you are providing $7/hr of value, are you likely to be able to keep that job or not? It depends on how much surplus value the business is generating, whether your value is improving over time and whether your manager/employer recognizes these facts. If the value supplied by the employees is much lower than the labor costs of the business, that business is destined for failure. This applies no matter your background.
There is room within this system for improvement and training and several other things. There is also room for bad managers/employers and good managers/employers. Over time, the bad ones will fail and the good ones will succeed more often than not. The minimum wage sets the lower level of where an employer is willing to take a chance on someone for a job. In giving them responsibilities necessary to the success of the business, the employer is taking a chance of failure in hiring that person and a chance of success leading to surplus value. Failure can doom the entire business and success can be shared among the employees. Good and bad mangers/employers are built in the gray areas here.
The higher the minimum wage is, the less risk the employer is able to take on an employee. So, while those employed will enjoy a better situation, the overall number employed will decrease. Supply and demand. This is a barrier for those in low income situations looking to improve and get out of those situations. If there was no minimum wage, then everyone could come to an agreement to work and improve their experience and skillset and begin working their way up the ladder.
Another barrier to this is the welfare cliff. When low income people are getting assistance from the government that is based on their income, there is no incentive get experience and gain skills that will move them beyond those income levels because when they do, there is an actual DECREASE in total income when the government benefits are taken away over a relatively small increase in personal income. Unless an individual or family can somehow leap over a large income gap (which varies from state to state) it makes no sense for them to even try because in the “in between” portions, their financial situation will be even worse than the government-assisted poverty they are already living in. Both the minimum wage and government assistance programs are wide ranging, bi-partisan policies that were passed with much lauded fanfare about the good that they will do.
Secondly, rather than becoming an employee, those in low income situations may choose to start a business given some skill that they already possess. Meal prep, plumbing, carpentry, construction, lawn care, taxi service . . . at this point I will focus on business type items as those special individuals with artistic or athletic talent are a whole different story. What are the barriers to entry for these businesses? Let’s take taxi service as an example. What do you need to be a taxi service? A car and yourself and some knowledge of the area you are going to operate in or a really good navigation app, right? To do it LEGALLY, you will also need a driver’s license, insurance (which may need to be enhanced insurance if you are planning on having paying passengers regularly), car registration and safety inspection at a minimum. Ok, that’s not too bad. If you can get enough fares, you can pay for all of that and still make a living and hopefully improve/expand over time with hard work. In Houston (a fairly unregulated Taxi market) you must also pass criminal background and fingerprint tests, pay for a special driver’s license, you are limited on which types of cars you can use and how old they can be, there are additional fees for taxi cab permits and company operator permits and the additional costs are around $2000/year just to meet city ordinances, this does not include costs that may be involved with getting the correct type and age of transportation to be able to start the business in the first place. Depending on how low your low-income situation is to begin with, any one of these barriers to entry may be enough to disqualify you on startup expenses or having to get a loan through the banking system, which would subject you to different levels of scrutiny and increase the costs of doing business for lower income individuals over higher income individuals. These relatively minor costs are to set up in Houston, which is not a huge taxi town . . . what about New York, Boston, Chicago, Philadelphia. Just a taxi medallion is those cities (permit to operate a single taxi) are $135,000; $40,000; $60,000; $50,000 respectively. Those are one-time costs, not yearly, but still prohibitive to low income people looking to improve their situations. There is no reason for these costs except that the number of medallions is intentionally kept scarce by the city governments in question. It should also be noted that ride-sharing apps have reduced the costs of each of these medallions by 50-90% since 2014, but that many airports and municipalities have tried to make Uber and Lyft illegal to use from their facilities. These are governments trying to keep their power in place and away from decentralized systems controlled by individuals.
The same is true at some level in ALL of the business ideas that I mentioned above. The amount of city, state and federal regulations to start a business of any kind drive the start-up costs so high that low-income individuals cannot afford it on their own and thus must apply to loans which, again comes with a whole different set of scrutiny and increased costs that are uniquely targeted at low-income individuals. This also does not even begin to address the tax burdens on business from the government digging into overall profits at some level.
What’s another way to get out from a low-income situation? Get an education of some sort and get a jump in income from a college degree or some specialized vocational training. What are the barriers to entry for these programs? Cost, entry requirements, time to complete are all barriers involved here. Cost issues are directly the fault of bi-partisan policies around government guaranteed student loans. Since there is no loss possibility for the schools they keep raising the costs to attend because people will continue to pay the costs to get the degrees and if they fail to pay it back, then the school still gets its money from the government though the student’s credit rating is ruined (which can make it even harder for them to get out of the low-income situation though they now have a degree or certification in place) and the cost is spread throughout the taxpayer base via deficit spending. Entry requirements may initially disqualify low-income individuals who may not have access to the level of education or other needs to qualify for certain programs in the first place. Time to complete the programs may also be of issue if the individual must complete the program while still earning a living, further complications may arise if any low-income grants or scholarships may be counted as income that would increase their limits beyond that of qualifying for government assistance . . . the welfare cliff strikes again!!
Ideally, the low-income individual is able to attend the program on scholarship, that does not disqualify them from other forms of government assistance they are counting on, can complete the program quickly and maintain their current (albeit low) standard of living while doing so. The education/training that they receive then will help them to leap over the welfare cliff and remove themselves from government assistance and see an ACTUAL increase in their standard of living as a result. That’s a lot of conditions needed for success with government getting in the way at every step.
So that’s the Summer rioters side of things. The law enforcement arm of the government disproportionately affects low income individuals due to policies in place and demographics mean that people of color are those most affected. Other policies in place also help to prevent those that are currently in low-income situations from getting themselves out of those situations at every possible avenue. This leads to a widespread belief in systemic racism, unrest and distrust of the government and authority at large. Unfortunately, there is also a, in my opinion, false belief that expansion of the exact programs that are providing obstacles to the advancement of low-income individuals will help them to get out of those situations. This is, again, my opinion, but I believe that it is backed up well by facts and a conservative (Austrian) view of economics.
So, having said all of that . . . how can I still say that Trump supporters aren’t that different? Remember, a LOT of Trump supporters are lower, lower middle, middle class blue collar type workers who if they aren’t actually low-income individuals, they aren’t very far from being so. Everything that applies above applies to them too. Though many are out of government assistance and doing all they can to continue to climb the rungs of the ladder. This is an oddly aligned group, they have some issues equal with the Summer rioters, but they have some issues with the next group of people as well.
The other side of the Trump coin are those that are definitely beyond the labels of low-income individuals, but they have a lot of the same complaints as their middle class counterparts. Their complaints are mostly economic. Why are my taxes so high? Where do those expenses go? Why are we sending so much foreign aid with so many problems at home? Drain the swamp!! We’ve heard these slogans and arguments over and over. While many of them are coming from a point of self-focus and doing their best to keep what they feel they have earned with their time and effort, in truth, the things that they are against are the same things that the Summer rioters and BLM are against. The government has failed us all, is pitting us against one another and continuing to grow no matter which side wins elections.
If Ds win, the Summer rioters are happy and the Trump supporters are unhappy. On the surface, they seem wholly divided and at odds on every level. The Summer rioters want expanded minimum wages, expanded welfare programs, weaker policing laws and wider tax bases for high income individuals. The Trump supporters are angry that their taxes may go up and be used for these expanded programs and we argue around and around about what is happening.
What actually happens? Taxes may rise some, but the end result is government spending beyond the tax base, no matter what it is. How does this affect every individual in the country? Higher-income people are unhappy because they have to pay more in taxes so they have to figure out a way to make up those losses or decrease their standard of living. Count on ALL people to ALWAYS want to keep or improve their standard of living, no matter what that is. So, the taxes among the high-income individuals are passed on through their businesses to the low and middle income individuals in the form of higher prices on whatever they are selling. Additionally, even with the expanded tax base, there is no limit on spending and the deficit increases. Since we are monetizing the debt through the Federal Reserve at this time that means that the dollar begins to weaken as many more of them go into circulation. Factoid – in 2020 we increased the number of total dollars circulating in the economy of the world by more than 20%. That means that each individual dollar has less buying power as time marches on. Who does this disproportionately affect? Again . . . low-income individuals. Those are the people that are more likely to have only access to dollars by living paycheck-to-paycheck or having some modest savings. Those with investments and real property or assets will realize the ability to sell those assets for larger and larger amounts of dollars and be able to stay ahead of the inflation curve by doing so intelligently while those needing to buy milk and bread and gasoline directly from their weekly wages will see the prices of those go up while their paycheck remain the same. So even though the Summer rioters are happy with who won, the monetary policies that keep them as low-income in perpetuity are continued and expanded and they get all of the things that they ask for and the situation does not change. In the next election cycle, they are promised that it only didn’t work because “we didn’t go far enough” and “we are going to spend so much more to make things better for you!!” and the cycle continues.
If the Rs win, then the Trump supporters are happy and the Summer rioters are unhappy. The Trump supporters want lower taxes, to keep policing at the level it is, reduced government assistance benefits and more of the expenditures of the government staying in the US rather than going overseas. The Summer rioters are angry because systemic racism will continue to exist in the form of the policies discussed above, their standard of living may decrease depending on which state they live in and how many changes can be implemented and higher-income individuals will be keeping more of what they earn.
What actually happens? Taxes may go down some, but the government never cuts spending so the deficits continues to rise. All of the programs that are keeping low-income individuals are still in place, so they are still trapped where they are and all of the items that occur from monetizing the larger debt still hold in place. The only benefit is that since the deficits cannot grow as quickly due to a more limited tax base, the decline is not as swift. See the paragraph above about the effects of expanding the deficit and monetizing the debt through the Fed. All of this holds no matter who wins!! Rs will continue to win until enough of the higher-income individuals are convinced that they have to expand programs to help the low-income individuals get out of their situation or the number of lower-income individuals outnumber all other demographics and vote for their own benefits and the cycle continues.
That is what I mean when I say that the Summer rioters and the Capitol rioters are not that far apart. All they really want is the means to actually succeed when they put forth the effort to do so and not to be hindered by government at every turn. While I believe that there are some on each side motivated by less lofty ideals than that (racism/hatred/greed or wanting a free ride through life from the taxpayers) I do not believe they are in great numbers on either side.
The true issue is that the centralized federal government has gotten too big and has infiltrated every facet of our lives. So much so that the degree to which it affects every avenue of advancement for every individual is not blatantly obvious in every case anymore. We can all see that we are struggling on some level and we would all be better off if not for “this.” What “this” is may vary for every individual, but if you look at the root cause of “this” in every case it most likely comes from a regulation or requirement from a bloated government entity. We have been trained since the Great Depression to look more and more to government to be the solution to our problems. This worked well when the majority of people representing us in the government had honor, integrity and the good of the people and the country in their hearts. This is no longer the case, it is a rarity to find a true servant among politicians at the Federal and State levels. The sorts of people that gravitate to that level of power and influence are more likely to abuse it than to use it for the good of others. We as voters have gotten bad at discerning those that will serve us vs. those that will use us and it’s as simple as that.
So yes, the grievances of the two sides that seem to be so far apart are not actually all that different. We have just been divided by rhetoric and convinced that the person on the other side of the argument is the enemy rather than the puppeteers that are stirring us into a frenzy for their own amusement and for their own gains.
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Commenter #1 - So, in a nutshell, income makes the grievances the same? Your position makes more sense when it is anchored to that.
Me - Both sets of them have been failed by the long term and continuing policies of the government, unless you are part of the group that can actually afford to buy influence in Washington. Everyone else is chasing scraps and being held down on some if not all avenues.
Commenter #1 - Personally, I believe the impact of white supremacy / racism - going deeper and further in history than where I think you are starting the narrative- makes this fundamentally a different set of “grievances”. And I don’t agree that seeking to address this is a “less lofty ideal”, as you put it.
Editorial Note - the commenter misunderstood my representation of "less lofty ideals" - I was not saying that fighting racism was less lofty, I was saying that those motivated by racism/hatred/greed or wanting a free ride on the taxpayers were the less lofty ones. So I ignored that part of their comment when replying with the comment below.
Me - That makes for a different source to draw from, but what is seen as "systemic racism" is really just the same government policies that are in place and affecting all Americans. Lower income Americans are affected disproportionately by all of the policies no matter their intention. So yes, under the bootheel, it feels like systemic racism, but the truth is that the highest affected demographics just happen to include a higher percentage of people of color. The crony capitalism, corrupt, deficit spending group we have installed and allowed to set up laws and regulations that make it more likely for them to constantly recycle through would be grinding to dust whoever is on the bottom rungs and doing their best to expand the grinding up the ladder as far as they can! Further expansion and buy-in to the same old ideals pushing towards bigger government, more control and less freedom will perpetuate that. This next part is going to hurt, but hear me out. Trump did a lot wrong. Wanting to expand the police state, divisive rhetoric, expanding deficit spending, increasing tariffs and practically having a trade war, these are all policies that expand the government, or at least prevent cooperative dialog, but what did he do to shrink the government? He lowered taxes and removed a good deal of background regulation on businesses and the energy sector of the economy. What happened in that specific space? For regular, normal Americans, life got a whole lot better. Everyone was working, the price of gasoline and most things that were needed day-to-day were the lowest they have been in a long time and we actually over supplied the world with oil causing a price crash. That's bad for the energy industry, but great for many normal Americans. When did this good pathway stop? When the virus came to the forefront and policies once again turned to expanding government, expanding control, limiting freedoms and increasing government deficits. Then everything snowballed from there and we find ourselves having elected the big government poster children and installed them with unfettered control for at least 2 years. Do you think those that were disenfranchised under Trump's policies once he went back to expanding the government will do any better over the next 2-4 years? Or will they have the same issues come election time and be fed the same failed policies with a new coat of paint on them? To me it is blatantly obvious what few decisions Trump made that no other politician would make that worked. The rest of his agenda was complete BS, just like every other politico out there, so why can't we try electing people that believe in the pieces that had success (freedom, deregulation, shrinking influence and cutting taxes) and similar policies (cutting spending, balancing the budget and removing national debt) instead of lumping those few successes in with all of the bad, typical political decisions he made and throwing them all out for the status quo? If you look closely and with an open mind, you can see what worked and what didn't. The reason there is a set of people so loyal to him is because they focus on the few things he did that were good that no other politicians would have ever done. The reason there are so many against him are the way he went about his business, his lack of caring/understanding and all of the things he did badly like a regular politician. We need to focus on the results of the specific decisions made the last 4 years and not either be "all-in" or "all-out" on the person making them. We are smart enough to see what worked (a few things) and what didn't (most of the rest). It's obvious to me what they were and I'm trying to expand that viewpoint and get people to realize that we need more outsiders to break the R/D hold on the government. The outsider policies of Trump were successful when they stuck to libertarian values. Everything else was pandering and populist BS. Let's focus on the little bit of libertarianism we were shown, let Trump fade into the background and start to apply the one good thing he showed us works. When framed like this literally every good thing that happened and every bad thing that happened over the last 4 years can be explained. Was it a libertarian idea? Then it was mostly a good result. Did it go against libertarian ideas? Then it was probably a bad result, no matter the intentions. If you look at the unbiased results of policies, I think you will see this to be true. So, if we can easily separate successes and failures by applying a simple set of ideals, why not try those applications more widely?