Why We Have Voter Apathy

It was an old friend of mine who used to joke that he didn’t care either way about apathy.  But when apathy is being used to describe US voters, it is no joke.   

To be sure, low voter turnouts are also caused by politically imposed restrictions that make it difficult or very inconvenient for many to vote.  And Voter ID laws pushed by Republicans in a number of states are despite their denials, designed to make it especially difficult for groups of citizens who tend to vote Democratic. 

But why do so many in the US often choose not to vote?   Voter apathy in America is nothing new.  Libertarian author Robert Ringer in his 1979 book Restoring the American Dream offers this cynical observation in a section subtitled Can 70 Million Americans Be Wrong? 

Citizens are continually urged to vote.  Media and celebrity pawns flood us with admonishing slogans like, “If you don’t vote, don’t gripe.”  Even acquaintances make perplexing statements to the effect that “it doesn’t matter who you vote for, just so you vote.” (Why doesn’t it matter???)

 

And yet, not withstanding this constant barrage of reasonless rhetoric, nonvoters continue to increase their standing as the true majority in every election.

 

If half the people in this country are not voting, it is fairly obvious they are telling the government something.  But the government, instead of being responsive to the people whom it supposedly represents, retaliates with an endless barrage of slogans, the essence of which are, “It’s your duty to vote.” 

Ringer looks at voting as “a process of legitimization” of what many view as a corrupt political system that they may not wish to validate.  He then goes on to write:

The truth is that if politicians were honest, they would encourage a person to vote only if he sincerely believed in one of the candidates.

First of all, it needs to be pointed out that the “half of the people...not voting” that Ringer refers to are for presidential elections.  For off-year elections, especially in the primaries, turnout can be often less than 20% so if anything, he is greatly understating the lack of voter turnout.  

Although my political persuasion has evolved over the years from libertarian to liberal, I think Ringer has put his finger on the question as perceived by too many Americans:  Is there anybody out there who is really worth voting for? 

In my view, voter apathy is not the cause of our problems, but is instead a symptom of serious problems we have in our political system. 

If there is a number one problem, it is the large (and ever growing) influence of big money in our political system.  I’m sure there are dozens of people across the country who would make compelling candidates we would want to go out and vote for but we will never hear of them because they don’t have the personal wealth and/or financial backing needed to run an effective campaign.  In essence, most of our politicians at least on the state and national level are either wealthy enough to self-finance a campaign or must become beholden more to their large campaign contributors than the voters.  It’s hard for voters to get excited over candidates who are effectively chosen to run by others in power.  Going to all publicly financed elections would be a giant step in the right direction – but don’t expect the wealthy and corporate influencers who exert so much power under the present system to willingly give up that power. 

As a political junkie, you would expect that I would make it a priority to vote in every single election.  But I must confess that you would be wrong. 

In the recent primary election in Pennsylvania, we voted for candidates to run for governor in November’s general election.  As a Democrat, I had the choice between 4 candidates who had essentially identical positions.  How can the average voter be able to intelligently choose between them?  But because one of the candidates, Tom Wolf spent a huge amount of his own money for saturation TV ads, it was announced by the news media that Wolf had an overwhelming lead in the polls leading to the election – a prediction that came true with his crushing victory over his rivals.  Now Mr. Wolf may indeed be an OK candidate.  But it is disheartening that he won and the others got crushed mostly because he had the large amount of money at his disposal that the others didn’t.  And as for the Republican ballot, the incumbent governor ran unopposed.  Given all of this, was it a surprise to see far more poll workers in the building than voters?

The other principal candidates on the ballot especially during off-year elections are for the election of judges.  But unless you are a trial lawyer who has worked in an incumbent judge’s courtroom, you have likely never seen the judge at work.  And in addition, it is generally viewed as incorrect for a judge to espouse political positions which is why you often hear little more than that they are in favor of “law and order”.  And on top of that, many judicial candidates in primary elections are even allowed to cross-file and appear on both party ballots thereby hiding the party they are affiliated with.  So campaign strategy mainly consists of an attempt at saturation advertising by way of TV ads along with endless road and yard signs to try and burn a candidate’s name into voters’ minds so that they recognize and pick that name out among the mostly unfamiliar names on the ballot. One of the most memorable campaigns for me from many years ago was for a judicial candidate named Silvestri Silvestri.  His ads consisted of little more than the simple catch line: Silvestri Silvestri – A name worth repeating!  And it was good enough to win elections; check out this interesting story about him. But again, it is any surprise that so many voters don’t bother to show up for elections like this?

In fairness, local Bar Associations do make recommendations on judicial candidates for those voters who want to take the time to look them up.  And it used to be that local papers used to cover judicial candidates (along with the elected row offices that perform basic governmental functions) to provide helpful insight on them.  But with many newspapers in financial distress and cutting back on manpower, features like this have almost disappeared.  A compelling case can be made that judges shouldn’t even be on the ballot and should instead be chosen by merit selection committees.  For more on this, the reader is invited to check out one of my previous postings A Better Way to Pick Judges.

But by far the biggest offenders in turning off the electorate are the anti-government zealots, notably those in the Tea Party.  These are the people who say they hate government but want to run for office so they can become a part of it, obstructing anything it does sometimes even to the point of shutting it down. This causes our government to become dysfunctional not only due to the resulting partisan gridlock but also because necessary government functions are starved for money and resources (like the Veterans Administration, for example). So now these same people can then reinforce their message that government is no good at anything!

But when government is seen as no good at anything, more and more disillusioned citizens (especially those in the moderate part of the political spectrum) will just throw up their hands and say what’s the use in voting?  The result is often low turnout elections that disproportionately favor – you guessed it – those same anti-government zealots!  How convenient!

So there is no misunderstanding – I am not downplaying the vital importance of free elections in a democracy.  But just having the right to vote isn’t enough on its own; there must also be what are perceived as real choices available to have a truly engaged electorate.  After all, dictatorships give their citizens the right to vote but no real choices.  Just imagine what the voter turnout would be in those countries if voting wasn’t mandatory!

There are recent examples of citizens getting really excited about an election.  We can all vividly recall President Obama’s first presidential campaign based on what he called Hope and Change that culminated in an emotional victory celebration where many of the participants were overcome with tears.  More recently, a populist newcomer to politics, Elizabeth Warren with rabid support from many even outside of Massachusetts was propelled to an improbable US Senate victory there.

Speaking of Elizabeth Warren, I am convinced that if she were to spread her populist message on the national presidential stage that she is and will be working for the interests of the middle class and poor instead of for the rich and powerful – she would gather a great deal of support from the electorate as a needed breath of fresh air.  But the Democratic Party machinery and financial support are already overwhelmingly lined up behind Hillary Clinton.  Which means that if Hillary decides to run, Elizabeth Warren will not be a choice and anybody else who may run against Hillary will have little chance for the nomination. 

So just like so many elections before it, our choices on whom we can vote for in 2016 will be largely determined by whichever candidate gets the most financial support from big donors who will then expect the winner to work for them and not the voters.  Is it any wonder that so many prospective voters have just given up?

Betting Our Planet's Future on Climate Change

Just this last month, the Obama Administration fired the latest salvo in the discussion around climate change.   Its presentation summarizes that climate scientists overwhelmingly agree that not only is climate change happening at a dangerous rate but that human activities such as burning fossil fuels and depleting the rain forests are a predominant cause.  I have read through much of the report which the interested reader can access through this link. 

Since this is a complex subject, there is a fair amount to read through.  But having said this, the material is not only presented to be understandable to the layperson but is also well organized.  Unlike a book, the reader can easily roam between topics of interest by clicking on appropriate links.  If the reader only has time to read one part of the report, I would recommend going through the Frequently Asked Questions which address many of the issues that are raised by those who question the validity of the scientific assertions on climate change. 

Of course, not everybody agrees that climate change is real or if they do, feel that man has little or nothing to do with it which makes it at least for some laypeople, a controversial issue.  But for about an estimated 97% of climate research scientists, there is no controversy and that this is a settled issue.  Do we put our faith in some laypeople who may well have economic and/or political motivations for denying climate change or should we put our trust in the climate scientists who have thoroughly studied this?  This is perhaps the most crucial question of all. 

Scientists studying the warming of the earth is nothing new.  Back in the 1820s, the greenhouse effect was discovered and since then, while it may have been studied over the years, it was mostly discussed within the scientific community.  Especially in the later part of the 20^th century, the concept of ‘global warming’ was bandied about but again, this was not often discussed as a mainstream issue like it is today. 

That changed when former Clinton VP Al Gore decided to make it his mission to alert our general population along with governments about the dangers of global warming.  Perhaps his signature achievement was his Oscar-winning documentary An Inconvenient Truth.  In the movie, Gore presents a compelling case supporting the existence of man-made global warming based on scientific evidence.  Today, in order to stress that it is not just about warmer temperatures but also about many other issues like stronger storms and more severe droughts, the term ‘climate change’ is more often used nowadays to convey this. 

So having Al Gore as a champion for educating us on climate change was good news and bad news.  The good news is that he was a household name and face that we all knew.  The bad news is that he is one of the people that conservatives just love to hate.  If Gore says that global warming or climate change is real, then in their minds it must be false!  No other proof needed!  Many times when discussing this issue with conservatives, instead of discussing the science, it deteriorates into personal attacks against Gore.  And although Republican John McCain has spoken out for the need to deal with climate change when he ran for president back in 2008 (along with Jon Huntsman in 2012), climate change denial is pretty much a requirement for anybody seriously seeking the Republican presidential nomination today.  It is a sad commentary on our present political climate that science is now argued as a partisan issue.

 

Climate forecasting is indeed a complicated science that involves tremendous amounts of measuring and computer modeling over a longer period of time which is a whole lot different than forecasting the weather which is much more changing and unpredictable.  So how does the layperson sort out technical subjects like this?  It’s simple. We have to rely on the experts in a field who have dedicated their lives to their specialties. 

For example, since I do not have a medical degree, if I want to get an expert opinion on the state of my health, I would go to my physician.  For whatever reason, I may not agree with his or her diagnosis, but I can always get a second opinion.  Or a third or even more if I wish. But if they all come to the same conclusion, I can still deny it but one can then logically argue that I am just denying reality.  What this is about is the concept of expert consensus.  This is far more than just a consensus of laypeople who may well have an interest in a subject but not the expertise of a specialist in the field. 

Yes indeed, experts can and often do disagree.  But if about 97% of climate scientists agree that we do have man-made climate change, it is most reasonable to call this an expert consensus and one can again logically argue that those who disagree are just denying reality.  

It has been argued by some that many scientists are pretending to agree on the existence of climate change based on financial gain or political ideology.  But any true scientist is only concerned with one thing – and that is getting to the truth wherever it may lead us.  If Al Gore is proven to be right on climate change, that’s OK.  But if Al Gore is proven to be wrong, that’s just as OK.  

A true scientist is always questioning.  Perhaps the greatest thing that could happen in a scientist’s life would be to prove through peer-reviewed research that what we have already ‘known’ was indeed not the case.  Put another way, if someone were to come up with solid peer-reviewed scientific proof to disprove climate change, that person would be first in line for a Nobel Prize along with the fame and fortune that would go with it. 

Indeed, the experts have been known to change their minds when confronted with new scientific evidence!  For example, when Isaac Newton gave us the basic laws of physics, they were considered to be equally applicable everywhere throughout the universe. No scientist seriously questioned this until the 20^th century when Einstein through his Theory of Relativity showed that particles traveling at or near the speed of light can violate Newton's laws which until then totally explained the workings of the universe. 

Instead of questioning the motives of the climate scientists, we should question those who have far more to gain from climate change denial – the fossil fuel producers!  The only way to try and address climate change is to burn less fossil fuels such as coal, oil, and gas and to rely more on renewable sources of energy – which would result in less profits for these corporations.  Perhaps the most active financial supporters of climate change denial are the Koch Brothers, billionaire inheritors of Koch Industries, a vast conglomerate, who have tirelessly fought against regulations that would help to keep our air and water cleaner.  But it is a delicious irony that even though the PBS science show NOVA has kept a consistent position warning of the dangers of man-made climate change, one of the major underwriters of the show continues to be the David H. Koch Foundation whose mission is announced at the beginning of each show as “promoting public understanding of science.”  While this is a good thing, liberals are understandably skeptical.  Or perhaps this is a tacit admission that the campaign of climate change denial isn’t really about science after all! 

As an example of rhetoric from the right, I ran across a recent editorial Here's the reality from the Tribune-Review which serves as an alternative conservative voice to the more liberal Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.  The position of the editorial essentially says that their experts are right and that the climate scientists are pretty much completely wrong about climate change.  

Of course they are entitled to their opinion.  But was most disturbing about this was the deliberate misleading of the reader by stating that their experts, the NIPCC independently evaluates scientific evidence “without taking...corporate money”.  Indeed, they may not directly take corporate money, but they are heavily supported by The Heartland Institute, a conservative/libertarian think tank actively involved in climate change denial which has taken money from the fossil fuel industry including the aforementioned Koch Brothers.   

The first online commenter to the article summed things up well which I am including here:

Why does the Tribune Review uncritically accept the word of the NIPCC? This is an organization that was created by S. Fred Singer, who is well known not only as a denier of human causation of climate change, but also as a denier of the health risks of passive smoking. The NIPCC also has ties to the Heartland Institute, which receives major funding from ExxonMobil, Phillip Morris, The Walton Family Foundation, and even the Koch Brothers. All of this creates serious doubt about the objectivity and accuracy of anything the NIPCC reports. [The Wikipedia link on Heartland Institute funding indicates that ExxonMobil announced that they discontinued funding to Heartland in 2008.]

So which side of this issue of climate change do we take?  It is not a question to be taken lightly.  If the climate scientists are right, we are not only suffering the effects of climate change already but things will get a whole lot worse over the next century or so.  In addition to the severe weather in the way of devastating storms and droughts, rising sea levels from the melting polar ice caps may well make many coastal areas uninhabitable that are now densely populated. 

It can be argued that we may not be able to totally avoid the consequences of climate change that is now happening.  But through lesser use of fossil fuels we may well be able to make the effects less painful for our future generations.  And yes, China is still building coal-fired power plants with abandon.  But they are already suffering from horrible and sometimes debilitating air pollution that will only get worse. But there are signs that they too are starting to accept reality and starting the move away from fossil fuels.  But it will take the leadership of the US in addressing climate change to help make this happen. 

It is not an overstatement that we are betting the future of our planet on whether the forecasts of damage from climate change are true.  If you had to bet it all on one side or the other for all of the marbles, do you go with the 97% of the climate scientists or with the deniers?  That should be an easy one!

The Growing Problem of Wage Theft

With the US Senate’s most recent blocking of the Paycheck Fairness Act, the pay disparity between male and female workers is again in the news.

 

Despite a heavy messaging push from top Democrats, the Senate failed to pass the Paycheck Fairness Act on Wednesday, aimed at cutting into the national gender wage gap -- falling six votes short.

Had it passed, the bill would have made it illegal for employers to retaliate against a worker who inquires about or discloses her or his wages or the wages of another employee in a complaint or investigation. It also would make employers liable to civil actions. And as part of this bill, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission would be required to collect pay information from employers.

The one thing that jumps out at me, (and should to the reader, too) is the provision for ending retaliation against workers who share salary information with each other. For reasons that are unclear to me, how much we make is a very closely guarded secret with most people - even with others we work with. The only party that benefits from pay secrecy (other than those who are significantly overpaid compared to their peers) is the employer since it hides any inequities from those who are underpaid compared to their peers.

For example, if Employee A is getting say, $20/hour because it has been mutually agreed that this is a fair wage for this person, if Employee B is making $15/hour for doing the same work and performing equally, the second employee is clearly being taken advantage of for his or her ignorance of what others are making.

An unethical practice we are hearing more and more about is known as wage theft as Wikipedia defines it here.

Wage theft is the illegal withholding of wages or the denial of benefits that are rightfully owed to an employee. Wage theft, particularly from low wage legal or illegal immigrant workers, is common in the United States. Wage theft can be conducted through various means such as: failure to pay overtime, minimum wage violations, employee misclassification, illegal deductions in pay, working off the clock, or not being paid at all. These violated rights have been guaranteed to workers in the United States since 1938 by the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). [The proponents of the proposed Fair Paycheck Act argue that this would simply provide better enforcement of the FLSA.]

Wikipedia in the article goes on the make this statement.

An issue not always recognized as a central topic in wage theft is the existent gender pay gap between men and women.

If one accepts that pay gaps between men and women performing the same work is wage theft, then why shouldn’t similar significant pay gaps between other workers that are not gender related also qualify as wage theft? I believe that this shouldn’t just be about fairness to women, but fairness to all of our workers.

The idea of openly sharing salary information among workers is not as crazy as some may believe. Unions routinely do this and in the case of sports players' unions, their members’ salary information has been made public. (Those who listen to sports talk shows know that much of the discussion is about whether certain athletes are worth what they are being paid.)

The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette article Steelers could see Maurkice Pouncey's price go way up illustrates the benefit to the athletes.

The price for the Steelers to sign [elite National Football League] center Maurkice Pouncey to a new contract just took another twist, thanks to Alex Mack. Mack signed a five-year, $42 million offer sheet with the Jacksonville Jaguars, and the Browns decided to match it rather than let him go and receive nothing in return.

That makes Mack the highest-paid center in the NFL. Maurkice Pouncey can justify saying he should be the highest paid.

Regrettably, it is likely the lowest paid workers who are most often the victims of wage theft. It appears to be especially prevalent in the fast food industry with McDonald's among others being the targets of a number of lawsuits. It’s bad enough when most of these workers are forced to accept a wage that is not enough to live on. But many be even be getting screwed out of some of that. This is outrageous!

But plenty of others are getting screwed too! Check out this recent NYT editorial Wage Theft Across the Board.

When labor advocates and law enforcement officials talk about wage theft, they are usually referring to situations in which low-wage service-sector employees are forced to work off the clock, paid subminimum wages, cheated out of overtime pay or denied their tips. It is a huge and underpoliced problem. It is also, it turns out, not confined to low-wage workers.

In the days ahead, a settlement is expected in the antitrust lawsuit pitting 64,613 software engineers against Google, Apple, Intel and Adobe. The engineers say they lost up to $3 billion in wages from 2005-9, when the companies colluded in a scheme not to solicit one another’s employees. The collusion, according to the engineers, kept their pay lower than it would have been had the companies actually competed for talent. [The lawsuit was indeed settled out of court for a payment of $324 million.]

The article goes on to say…

When wage theft against low-wage workers is combined with that against highly paid workers, a bad problem becomes much worse.

Data compiled by the Economic Policy Institute show that in 2012, the Department of Labor helped 308,000 workers recover $280 million in back pay for wage-theft violations — nearly double the amount stolen that year in robberies on the street, at banks, gas stations and convenience stores.

Moreover, the recovered wages are surely only a fraction of the wage theft nationwide because the Labor Department has only about 1,100 wage-and-hour investigators to monitor seven million employers and several states have ended or curtailed wage enforcement efforts.

I agree with Washington Post op-ed writer Catherine Rampell who believes that wage theft should be treated as a criminal offense.

Harsher penalties, including prison time, should be on the table more often when willful wrongdoing is proved. Thieves caught stealing thousands of dollars from someone’s home can go to jail; the same should be true for thieves caught stealing thousands of dollars from someone’s paycheck.

The Party of Big Business and Big Money

A few weeks ago, while at my local library, I saw a discussion group assembling for their monthly meeting. One of the leaders of the group, recognizing me from another discussion group that I have attended, invited me to participate.  Often, these discussions can be mind-numbing philosophical ones.  But when she said the discussion would be about healthcare, I just couldn’t resist.  And knowing that many in my area are of a conservative persuasion, I thought it would be interesting to hear things from their perspective.  And I must say that I wasn’t disappointed.

 

So the moderator asked an open-ended question to get things started.  How is healthcare working in America?  An elderly 80-something woman said that her healthcare was just fine, thank you and that healthcare works just fine as long as the government isn’t involved.  I gently reminded her that her insurance comes from Medicare which is a government program.  Nonplussed, she said that the government didn’t give her that insurance; she paid for it.  Not wanting to rock the boat, especially as a first time invited guest, I backed off.

 

But wanting to make a point, I then argued that if Medicare, while not perfect, if it seems to work for our oldest population in the worst health, couldn’t it work at least as well if we included all of the younger, healthier people in the risk pool?  This predictably got lots of grumbling from many about what they see as the “government takeover of healthcare” by the dreaded Obamacare.

 

Then to try and drive my point home, I said that the overhead for Medicare is at about 3% which is far lower that the overhead for private insurance companies that can be around 15 or 20%.  This was too much for them to hear and they let me have it with both barrels.  What I said couldn’t possibly be true because in their minds government is always more wasteful and less efficient than private companies.  With the majority there strongly believing this, it was difficult to argue further.  I just wish that I had an Internet article like this one or this one at my disposal to try and support this vital point I was trying to make.

 

Once the group got really riled up, they started talking about how they don’t want government to make them pay for somebody else’s insurance.  And then another person sitting across from me said he didn’t want to pay for food stamps so others could use them to buy filet mignon and lobster.  What I wanted to say was that while someone could indeed buy these with food stamps, their monthly allotment for food would run out well before when it would be due to be replenished.  But clearly, this was about emotion and not logic.  More specifically, it was about their emotional frenzy against just about anything the government does.

 

There’s a lot of government hating out there – which would make sense if we had a dictatorship we didn’t elect in control of us.  But as much as we may not like some of those who lead us, they did have to legitimately win an election to get where they are.  Doesn’t that count for something?

 

Big government is taking away our freedom, they say.  If government can’t be cut down enough to suit some, shut it down.  And then there is the wish of conservative anti-tax advocate Grover Norquist who has stated that he wants to see the government so small that we can "drown it in the bathtub".  So what’s really feeding all of this relentless anti-government sentiment?  I think I know.  Let me explain.

 

While we all know that a government that is too strong is bad because it is repressive to its citizens, it is less intuitive that a government that is too weak is just as bad but for a different reason.  

 

A civilized society needs not only rules and regulations, but also somebody to enforce them.  And that’s government.  Among many other needs we have, we need to know that the air we breathe, the food we eat, and the water we drink is safe.  We need to know that our workplaces are safe and free of exploitation.  We want to be assured that people or businesses who make money from us do it without ripping us off through unfair or deceptive practices.

 

When government power is weakened too much, it creates a power vacuum.  One that is gladly filled by corporate and moneyed interests. To use the examples above, it is a political environment where companies don’t have to worry so much about pollution, or whether their workplaces are dangerous or their employees are being exploited or whether they can get away with the abuses like those in the financial sector that largely brought on the financial crash of 2008.

 

So when we see that a weakened government means more wealth and power for big business and big money, maybe there is indeed a hidden agenda behind all of the anti-government rhetoric.  But nobody can get far by saying that their agenda is to make more money, pay less taxes, have less regulation – and then use the additional money they make to buy even more power through lobbying and campaign contributions.  So they have to argue that it’s all about freedom from big government.  And for those in the Tea Party and likeminded people who already have an inherent dislike of government, this is an easy sell.

 

While it can be argued that these people simply want smaller government, their actions are rife with hypocrisy.  When it comes to food stamps to help the hungry, unemployment benefits to help the jobless, or health insurance to help those without access to healthcare, that’s too much big government and has to end!  But when it comes to more government handouts to the wealthy and to already highly profitable corporations, they make much less of a fuss.  Perhaps it’s as simple as not wanting to bite the hand that is feeding (or in this case financing) them. Having said this, the marriage between the Tea Party and corporate America has not always been a smooth one.  Shutting down the government or even the threat of it was not at all appreciated by the business community.

 

So the result of all of this has been an economy that in the last decade or so has been dreary for many of us in the middle and lower classes while meanwhile, large corporations and the wealthy have prospered handsomely.  And with the economy still hurting many people, it is easy for those on the right to say that we need a Republican president since the one we have now hasn’t been able to do much – ignoring the fact that much of his ineffectiveness has been due to the obstructionism by Republicans in Congress, all under the pretense of promoting small government.

 

While many political observers question whether a Republican will be able to carry a presidential election anytime soon considering the growing minority population, the party will still exert a significant amount of power in Congress and in many state governments.  With many congressional districts gerrymandered so that most Republicans are in safe districts, they are expected to remain in control of the House after the 2014 midterm elections.  And with many Democratic seats up for election in so-called “red states” which are often known for their strong anti-government sentiments, Republicans have a decent chance of gaining a Senate majority, too.

 

It was liberal commentator and comedian Bill Maher who said that he can understand why rich people vote Republican since that is whose interests they look out for.  It’s the others who aren’t rich and vote Republican that are more difficult to understand.  In my view, what is saddest is that many of the middle class and poor who have endured the most economic struggles in these down times will enthusiastically continue to vote Republican because they still believe fighting what they see as “big government” or “socialism” is the way to improve their lot in life – while those pulling the strings behind the scenes will continue to be laughing – all the way to the bank! 

Time to End the War on Drugs

Each January, governors of our states give an annual address usually labeled as a “State of the State” address which is patterned after the presidential State of the Union address.  These usually include a laundry list of issues that are nicely packaged to appease as many interests as possible.  Virtually all of these are quite forgettable.

 

But this January, Vermont Governor Peter Shumlin in a cry for help to get as much attention as possible, broke the mold by devoting his entire annual speech to a single issue – the growing heroin crisis in his state.

“In every corner of our state, heroin and opiate drug addiction threatens us,” he said. He said he wanted to reframe the public debate to encourage officials to respond to addiction as a chronic disease, with treatment and support, rather than with only punishment and incarceration.

Every week, he said, more than $2 million worth of heroin and other opiates are trafficked into Vermont. And nearly 80 percent of inmates in the state are jailed on drug-related charges.

The governor made a plea for more money for treatment programs, noting that incarcerating a person for a week costs the state $1,120, while a week of treatment at a state-financed center costs $123. He asked for money to expand treatment centers, where more than 500 addicts are on waiting lists.

And make no mistake – this is a growing problem that is affecting not just the urban poor but those at all economic levels including suburban and rural people.  Unfortunately, it took the death by heroin overdose of celebrated actor Philip Seymour Hoffman to bring this vital issue to the attention of the average American.

Certainly, this is a complex problem that eludes simple solutions.  But like for any problem, we can often make some headway by simply examining what works – and do more of it.  But just as importantly, we need to also see what is not working – and do less of that.

This is certainly unassailable logic.  But in my view, the biggest obstacle to making progress toward better solutions is that this problem is viewed by too many through a puritanical lens – the view that people who use drugs are immoral and should be punished by throwing them in jail.  This is the logic behind the so-called War on Drugs which is based on a belief that we can solve the drug crisis by incarcerating enough users and dealers.  But even many of the people who actively participated in this war have finally confessed that the war has been a failure that has resulted in the US having the world's highest incarceration rate (largely from drug offenses) with not much else to show for it except for the emergence of the for-profit prison industry which spends significant amounts of  money lobbying for policies that increase incarceration rates.

By 2010, drug offenders in federal prison had increased to 500,000 per year, up from 41,000 in 1985. Drug related charges accounted for more than half the rise in state prisoners. The result, 31 million people have been arrested on drug related charges, approximately 1 in 10 Americans.

Perhaps we should realize that treating this as the governor suggested as a public health crisis to be treated by medical personnel instead of as a moral/criminal issue to be addressed by law enforcement may well be a step in the right direction.  I urge the reader to read one of my previous postings, Can We Talk About Legalizing Drugs? for some of my thoughts on the matter.

I fully realize that legalizing drugs is a total non-starter for many people since this is perceived to convey public approval.  With marijuana now legalized in some areas with the approval of many, it is not hard to understand this view.  But legalizing (or at least decriminalizing) drugs can simply be an admission that this problem can better be solved by medical professionals as opposed to law enforcement which does not imply approval at all but is just a more effective means to address the problem and mitigate the damage it causes.  And in fact, our law enforcement efforts have tended to breed a host of unforeseen consequences more than effectively address the problem.

For example, there had been a steady rise in addiction to prescription pain killers, either starting from using these drugs for legitimate treatment of pain or perhaps another way to get high. However, instead of focusing efforts on rehabilitation to treat these addictions, the solution was to cut off these drugs and make them as difficult and expensive to obtain as possible with the presumption that addicts will then stop using these drugs.  But then heroin was discovered as a cheaper and more available source to satisfy these people’s addictions.  So now we have people who used to be prescription pain killer addicts now becoming heroin addicts.  Being a heroin addict now brings a whole lot of additional risks because there is no way to know for sure what is in that bag of heroin obtained from a dealer.  Earlier this year in the Pittsburgh area, there were about 23 deaths discovered of addicts buying heroin that unbeknownst to them was laced with fentanyl which greatly increased its opiate strength likely causing the fatal overdoses.  And then there is the added problem of spreading diseases by those sharing needles.  Clearly, this was a serious problem that was only made worse.

Recently, a task force in Southwestern Pennsylvania was assembled to make recommendations on how to address the heroin addiction crisis.  This was the most interesting one:

Cheryl Andrews, executive director of the Washington Drug and Alcohol Commission, along with several other panelists, lobbied for the passage of “Good Samaritan legislation” statewide. The legislation is designed to protect witnesses of an overdose who call 911. 

"There are people shooting dope who will literally let someone die so they won’t get prosecuted for using,” Ms. Andrews said.

This at least acknowledges that the fear of incarceration hampers efforts to help others in need of medical help to perhaps even save their lives.  By the way, this even includes doctors.  Read on. 

So what does work? One of the most promising drug treatments for heroin addiction is the use of suboxone which not only replaces the need for heroin but also has an opiate inhibitor that inhibits the high from taking heroin while on this drug.  This is an example of what is called opiate replacement therapy.

The track record of opiate replacement therapy, while not perfect, has permitted hundreds of thousands of Americans (and millions more worldwide) to achieve a reduction in the number and severity of relapses to illicit opiate use and associated costs to society in terms of criminal activity (burglary, theft, robbery, muggings) necessary to obtain money for drugs which ultimately wind up financing the vast, globally connected drug cartels. Additionally, opioid replacement therapy reduces the risk of contracting Hepatitis C and HIV among other communicable diseases.

While this certainly looks like a step in the right direction, for a long time doctors not part of rehabilitation centers were forbidden to treat addicts with drugs like this under threat of imprisonment.  These federal laws have been loosened a little but only a very small number of approved doctors have authorization to administer drugs like these because well, they too are illegal!

The drug enforcement community is now celebrating the recent capture in Mexico of Joaquín Guzmán who many considered to be the world’s number one drug kingpin.

Mr. Guzmán’s Sinaloa Cartel is considered the largest and most powerful trafficking organization in the world, with a reach as far as Europe and Asia, and has been a main combatant in a spasm of violence that has left tens of thousands dead in Mexico. 

But while they are celebrating, nobody is delusional enough to think that this signals any long lasting victory in the War on Drugs.  This is not like World War II when after we got Germany and Japan to surrender, the war was over.  As long as there is a lucrative market for drugs we deem to be illegal, there will be a never ending parade of new drug kingpins to carry on.

It remains to be seen if the arrest will interrupt Mexico’s thriving drug trade. The capture or killing of a drug lord sometimes unleashes more violence as internal feuds break out and rivals attack. And given the efficiency of the Sinaloa Cartel, it is possible the group will manage a smooth transition to a new leader and continue with business as usual.

Perhaps the biggest toll of all extracted by the War on Drugs has been on the many people who have been arrested for little more that possession and now have that on their permanent record.  It’s hard enough to find a job nowadays in any event.  But with many if not most prospective employers relying on background checks, having an arrest on one’s record can ruin any hopes for a productive career.  It was Barack Obama who wrote that in his younger years, he partook in marijuana along with some other illegal drugs.  Of course, his career went on to bigger and better things.  But if he had had the misfortune of being arrested for taking those drugs like so many others, do you think we would have ever heard of him after that?  I think not!

Losing the War on Poverty

This January marked the 50^th anniversary of the War on Poverty started by President Lyndon Baines Johnson.  Of course this had led to discussions among pundits and politicians as to whether this program really did much to eliminate poverty.  There are those who say that we had poverty back then and we still do now – perhaps even more.  So does this mean that its critics were right in that this was just another well-meaning government program that failed because it is just another thing that government just doesn’t do well? 

It’s hard to make such a generalization because life in the United States back in 1964 was so much different than it is now. 

It cannot be denied that the best way to stay out of poverty is a steady job that pays a living wage.  Back then at least for most of us, opportunities for these were ample if not abundant.  There was a choice of perhaps a manufacturing job for those who preferred a job working with their hands and for those who went to college, an opportunity to perhaps reach for the upper classes.  But while the college graduate could command a better salary, the blue collar workers were by and large also members of the middle class.  Do a good job and keep your nose clean and you could expect to not only make a living wage (often because of a union to negotiate on your behalf) but also have secure employment until you retire and get your company pension. 

Poverty existed, but much of it was suffered by minorities who didn’t get the same educational and job opportunities as others (remember it was the Civil Rights Act of 1964 that actually allowed blacks to share the same public facilities with whites where there was segregation). Ample job opportunities existed – it was just that some were shut out of them.  The only way to address this was for the government to get involved to try and promote equal opportunity for everybody to enter the middle class.  But regrettably, minority unemployment is still significantly higher than for others. 

The above scenario of 1964 has changed radically since then.  Blue collar manufacturing jobs have disappeared offshore to be replaced by low-paying service jobs.  While some have returned, many of them do not pay a living wage, especially with unions being stripped of much of their negotiating power.  Investing in a college degree nowadays is just as likely to result in a large college loan to pay off with no real professional job prospects. The dream of working for one company for life is now a fantasy with workers being dumped on a whim. And company pensions have gone the way of the dinosaur. 

So while poverty can have a number of different social causes, it is my view that the main driver of poverty today in the US is the severe and persisting lack of jobs that pay a living wage.   

At the present time, there are still about 3 job seekers for every job opening in the US as detailed in this link.

The Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) data released this morning [11/22/2013] by the Bureau of Labor Statistics showed that there were 3.9 million job openings for 11.3 million job seekers in September—meaning that for every job opening there were 2.9 people looking for work.  

While the job seekers ratio has been decreasing from a high of 6.7-to-1 during the Great Recession, today’s ratio of 2.9-to-1 matches the highest the ratio ever got in the early 2000s downturn In a labor market with strong job opportunities, the ratio would be close to 1-to-1, as it was in December 2000.

The JOLTS data are also a reminder that the current elevated unemployment rate has little to do with a skills shortage or mismatch, as unemployed workers dramatically outnumber job openings in all industries.

“In no industry does the number of job openings even come close to the number of people looking for work,” writes Gould. “This demonstrates that the main problem in the labor market is a broad-based lack of demand for workers—not, as is often claimed, available workers lacking the skills needed for the sectors with job openings.”

When the problem of long term unemployment and its possible leading into poverty is viewed this way, a lot of the prevailing “wisdom” on the subject turns out to be little more than hot air.  e.g. If we cut unemployment benefits, everybody will then go out and get a job.  If we can only retrain workers, they can then all get jobs.  If we could only reinvent ourselves, we can all get jobs. blah, blah , blah.  Moreover, the article points out that a decline in the number of job seekers because of people giving up in this weak labor market makes even these statistics look better than they actually are.  

In addition, there are conservative commentators such as David Brooks who for example in this op-ed column decry that the main cause of poverty and low social mobility is the fraying of the social fabric in America.  Surely there is something to this.  But few things can fray the social fabric of society better than poverty.  I believe the argument that poverty being a driver of much of our social dysfunction is a more persuasive one. 

Of course, one of the inevitable results of a lack of jobs is the unrelenting downward pressure on wages. So even if one can find a job, it is no guarantee that it will pay enough to avoid poverty.  The concept of a living wage for the so-called working poor is one that has been discussed by some.  The reader is invited to check out one of my previous postings A Living Wage for Americans for my thoughts on the subject.  

But for now, the pertinent question for Americans to answer is whether someone who works a 40 hour workweek deserves to live above the poverty line.  Sadly, there are all too many who believe the answer is not necessarily.  The argument goes that someone who does what is considered unskilled labor doesn’t deserve to be paid a living wage.  If they want a living wage, so the argument goes, they should go to school or get the training to acquire the skills to demand a larger paycheck.  This argument made perfect sense when there were an adequate number of jobs to be had, but makes less sense when there are job shortages in just about every field as noted above. 

But even if these people were able to move up to a better job in this scenario, what about the jobs they left behind?  Somebody still has to do these jobs!  For whatever the skills are of the management of say, a fast food restaurant to deserve their higher pay, without the so-called unskilled labor provided by the burger flippers, the counter workers, and even the people who clean the rest rooms, the company would be unable to make a dime!  When viewed in this light, don’t these workers at least deserve the dignity of a wage that takes them out of poverty? 

There is no question that poverty is becoming an ever increasing problem in the US, even with the economy said to be recovering.  We have increasing numbers of people needing food stamps to live on and many of the food banks are having trouble keeping up with the demand of hungry people. What is even more disturbing is that there are those in the middle class who are only a lost job, a divorce, or a healthcare catastrophe from falling into the depths of poverty themselves.  And although poverty has traditionally been associated with urban and rural dwellers, poverty rates are now surging in America's suburbs.

For example, poverty is up by almost 16 percent in the suburbs of Pittsburgh.  Up more than 27 percent in the suburbs of Providence.  Nearly 79 percent outside Seattle.  And in the suburbs of Austin, Texas, the number of poor has swelled almost 143 percent.  More poor people now live in America’s suburbs than in cities or in rural areas.

But America with its culture of individualism all too often pays lip service to those in need.  Instead of an attitude that we are all in this together, there is the attitude that you are on your own.  How else can one explain that there are so many who are not only against a living wage for the working poor but even a paltry raise in the minimum wage?  Or the campaign by some to cut safety net benefits like food stamps. 

But surely we can take care of the needs of our veterans who served honorably in Afghanistan and Iraq and to make sure that they can return to this country and successfully integrate into the workforce. Right? But for all of the times we say that we “salute their service”, news like this says all too often that we are giving them little more than the one-finger salute.  

It is the shame of America. The Department of Veteran Affairs reports that 48,000 veterans who served in Afghanistan and Iraq since 2001 are either homeless or in a special program to keep them off the streets.

We are the richest country on Earth that has the resources to eventually win the war on poverty – or at the very least, win some major battles against it.  Our economy generates an incredible amount of wealth – but little or none of it goes to those at the bottom who need it the most.  As long as our economy is unable to produce enough jobs that pay a living wage for everybody who wants to work, we will continue to lose the War on Poverty.  A prosperous economy for all simply cannot exist when there is stubbornly high unemployment.  Past experience has shown that government spending to stimulate the economy for things like needed infrastructure improvements have been much more successful in creating jobs than austerity measures that have resulted in Great Depression levels of unemployment in parts of Europe.

 

President Obama in his recent State of the Union address did note the need for infrastructure spending and also noted that nobody should work a 40 hour week and live in poverty.  So he then advocated a minimum wage increase to $10.10 per hour.  What is disheartening is that he is unlikely to get any support whatsoever for this from Republicans.  And even if he did, $10.10 per hour is hardly enough to raise anyone out of poverty.

 

An adequate number of jobs that pay a living wage is the only way to have a fighting chance to truly win the War Against Poverty nowadays. We have the means to do it.  All we need is enough people to really care!