On Getting Checks from the Government, Or, the Direct/Indirect Problem

[alcibiades_mystery]

I've seen a lot of posts here lately about how the generations after the Baby Boom have lost their way, have forgotten core Democratic principles. I've even agreed with many of these. But I think it's useful to consider the life experiences of your audiences when you make such arguments.

I'll say it plain: I have never received a check of any kind from the local, state, or federal government. Nothing. No unemployment, no SSI, no tax refund, except maybe that $300 that Bush contrived to bribe us with. Nada. And I don't think I'm the only one.

Now, don't get me wrong. Philosophically, I'm a Marxist, and I mean that in a classical sense. But in terms of actual life experience, the very notion that a government would send me money is just foreign. I've never experienced it. Maybe that makes me "lucky;" I don't know. But I think it has to be part of the discussion, especially since I probably live on indirect checks from the government. It is the problem of the direct and the indirect that we have to learn how to talk about.

I went to graduate school at a public university. Obviously, every check I received there for teaching assistantships and research support was "from the government." But it just seemed like it was from "my job." I teach at a private university, but if I did the math on the tuition contributions from loans and other government support, what I would learn is that some portion (and perhaps a majority) of my paycheck every two weeks is "from the government," though, again, it doesn't seem that way. No doubt this just scratches the surface: without public education, and infrastructure, and countless other social supports, my "job" wouldn't even exist, and etc., all the way down the line. But the way it appears (and again, in the classical Marxist notion of nur erscheinen, to merely appear) is different: I have never received a check of any kind from the government.

It's well and good to yell and scream. It's well and good to upbraid people for their positions. But if you want to get through to people, the idea of the direct and indirect social economic support seems to be the problem you need to hack. I'd rather see people working on how to solve this problem rhetorically than yelling and screaming and upbraiding.

[JDPriestly]

1. The screams about Social Security benefits are based on the

fact that those of us who receive benefits paid into the program and were promised way back when we were kids that our benefits would be paid when it was our turn. It is not a government hand-out.

We earned the money owed us just like you earned your paychecks when you taught as a graduate assistant. The money in the Social Security Trust fund was actually taken on the first pennies in our paychecks through our lives.

As if that were not enough, Social Security is the sole income for many of the poorest elderly in our country.

We who are screaming paid for the checks received by our parents and grandparents.

We paid extra into the Social Security Trust Fund after Reagan raised the FICA tax rate to insure there would be money to cover the baby boomers.

If you read the US Code, you will see that there really is a Social Security trust fund which is in the trust of the Treasury Department. The issue now is whether the money that was in the Trust Fund that was used to buy government bonds should be repaid.

The government is talking about how it cannot violate the full faith and credit of the government and must bay bond holders. Well, that same government thinks it is nothing to break the full faith and credit and promises it made to kids way back in the 1950s.

I got my Social Security card when I was 14. Many people born in my year and younger have paid in all their working lives.

It is positively criminal to have taken money from that fund and spent it on war or aid to other countries or whatever and not repay it. Not only is the government breaking promises made to children in the 1940s and 1950s but it is violating a covenant that it renewed repeatedly including by the Reagan administration when the rates were raised.

All that Congress has to do at this time is to withdraw the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy as well as some other largesse indulged in by the Bush administration. If it does that, the Trust Fund will continue to be quite strong and healthy and the governmetn will be able to keep its promises.

Obama ran on a promise that he would raise the FICA cap. He has kept or even tried to keep that promise. And the press does not remind him or Americans of it either.

[Alameda]

5. Very well said. I also started paying at the age of 14.....that is I

have paid into it for 55 years, I expect, and in fact, demand, it now. I'm worn out, but even though I get Social Security, I still need to supplement it to be able to live. There has been no cost of living raise in two years, although the cost of living has gone up. That already IS a reduction in Social Security.

[JDPriestly]

6. Right. Alameda

[Alameda]

7. I have been reading your journal and suggest others do to.....

You really know facts. Thanks for doing the research and posting it.

[snot]

2. I'm not sure I follow you:

Which "core Democratic principles" is it that you feel accused of having forgotten? And are you saying that, because of your life experience, you or at least others in your generation can't relate to some of them? Which ones?

I'm a boomer, and I've never received a check, either. But I want my taxes to help support those who can't help themselves, and I anticipate that in a decade or two, I might need help myself in the form of SS payments or Medicare.

Please spell your point out for me a little further.

[Lifelong Protester]

3. It's simple, I paid in, I want to get what I was promised

I've paid in for over 40 years, since I got my first job.

Many people, such as myself (who I guess must be the 'yelling' folks) have lived ALL of our working lives, with the KNOWLEDGE that what we paid in would come back to us in an 'annuity' or 'insurance' or whatever the term is that is acceptable. When you plan your retirement, and SS is a part of the plan, how fair is it to tell the person who hopes to retire one day, "Oh, sorry, that money we promised you isn't there anymore. Some rich folks got it in a tax cut."

The government isn't 'giving' me anything. It has been earned.

[Generic Other]

4. To me it is the equivalent of dishonoring a treaty obligation

This country has a history of doing stuff like that.

[rucky]

8. It's true.

My teabagging in-laws were ranting about them darn overpaid teachers, and I responded to the effect of "if you think that's bad, how about those defense contractors? They're one of the few industries doing well in this economy and it's all from taxpayer money." If we could take half of what we pay them and put it into schools, we may actually be able to recruit more talented teachers.

okay, that last statement was insincere on my part, but it matched my in-laws' sentiment and I think it may have gotten them thinking - at least for a few minutes.