I am a big fan of Paul Krugman, but I think he missed something important in today’s column.
First, let’s go back to November. In this blog post, Krugman pointed out correctly that it is silly to perceive an inconsistency or “hypocrisy” when wealthy individuals promote progressive taxation. If Warren Buffett believes that the good of the nation is against his self-interest, this is civic-minded unselfishness, the furthest thing from hypocrisy. Furthermore, the belief that the wealthy should pay more should never be confused with hatred of the wealthy, or self-hatred; one does not imply the other.
Today, Krugman points out a supposed contradiction between (a) conservative opposition to the social safety net and (b) the fact that social programs send more benefits to red states (which tend to be poorer) than blue states. What, conservatives can’t be civic-minded? Just as it is not inconsistent for Mr. Buffett to fail to volunteer higher tax payments, it is not inconsistent to accept benefits while believing they shouldn’t exist. If I find myself playing Monopoly with the horribly misguided house rule that money is placed under Free Parking, am I morally compelled to refuse the money, on the grounds that I believe with all my heart it shouldn’t be there? Clearly, no. It would be hypocritical to complain about other players’ accepting the Free Parking money while I do so myself, but not hypocritical to advocate that the rule itself be changed so that no one receives money including me.
(Side note: One shouldn’t actually conclude from a state-by-state correlation that the individuals receiving benefits are the ones opposing them. It is equally possible, based only on such data, that seeing one’s red-state neighbors receive benefits leads one to oppose them.)
Finally, while I think failing to note the analogy with his previous post was a big omission today, I do think that other evidence in the column tends to recover Krugman’s point. He wants to show that support for conservative austerity measures is based not on principle and willingness to fairly share sacrifice, but on perceived self-interest, which is in some cases misperceived. The column cites a study by Suzanne Mettler stating that over 40% of those receiving benefits from Social Security, unemployment and Medicare believe they “have not used a government program.” This does suggest the possibility that some conservatives are opposed to such programs only “for other people.” A lack of self-awareness can facilitate the cloaking of self-interest in a purported principled stand, which would indeed be hypocrisy. In contrast, Mr. Buffett could hardly miss the fact that a “Buffett tax” would fall heavily on him.
4 comments
February 18, 2012 at 1:43 pm
wellplacedadjective
regarding the buffett example: i agree he’s not being “hypocritical,” but i also don’t think that matters to the everyman.
he’s not saying: “come join me in feeding the poor.” he is saying: “i’ll help feed the poor if and only if you do too.” if he’s being genuine, then he’s expressing a kind of complementarity in his preferences… maybe we need a new word for that..?
but whatever we call it, it seems there’s something socially undesirable about it… (which can probably be formalized along the lines of a hold-up problem.)
February 19, 2012 at 1:14 pm
Eran
Buffett prefers $1 more in his pocket over $1 more in the treasury and he prefers $P more in the treasury over $1 more in his pocket. We all have similar preferences, each of us with his own P. We are all guilty of agreeing to feed the poor only if you do too.
When people call Buffett “hypocrite”, I don’t think they mean to say something about his preferences per se — they don’t argue that it is hypocrisy to have a small P or that it is hypocrisy to have a large P. I believe what they mean is that there is a distance between the preferences that are revealed by the policies Buffett advocates and the preferences he pretends to have: His P is in fact larger than what his public statements (“I should pay more taxes”) tries to imply. (I probably wouldn’t call it hypocrisy either but i think this is what people finds offensive)
March 7, 2012 at 9:24 am
Chris Dupre
Buffet’s hypocrisy is that he is advocating a tax on income, whereas he now has wealth. Now that Buffet has finished running the race (i.e. converted massive amounts of income into wealth), he thinks we should chain down all other contestants who are still running (trying to amass wealth through income). While his rules may be the same, the timing difference in their application is the critical inequality of his exhortations. Second, if Buffet believes he should pay more in taxes, he has the ability to make that selection on his tax forms to help “pay down the national debt.” Last, why should anyone naturally prefer P dollars in the Treasury? Why not prefer -P dollars less in government spending?
March 7, 2012 at 1:18 pm
Todd
Precisely.