The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) in America came up
with a prediction that triggered a debate hot enough to maybe affect climate
change in this cold winter season. Pardon me, but that last part was to make
light of the situation given that the debate is still ongoing and still hot.
And the reason why it is hot is that the CBO prediction is being discussed
mostly from the various political points of view rather than what is known
about economics and human behavior.
From the editorials to the columns to the expressed opinions
on the audio-visual media, you get a great deal of heat and little light as to
what America will look like in the future with the implementation of what has
come to be known as ObamaCare which, according to the CBO, will cause the loss
of somewhere between 2 and 2.5 million jobs over the next 10 years. You sense
that the debaters do not try to fully understand, much less soundly explain,
what they see happening in the country … and this is because they each try to
paint a picture that will reinforce a preconceived point of view – one that
says they are right and the other party is wrong.
And from that cacophony emerges a spectrum of images that
range from the extreme of optimism at one end, to the extreme of pessimism at
the other end. Those who oppose the Obama administration paint a picture of the
country that will come to look like the ultra Orthodox Jews in Israel who
refuse to work, and live on welfare because they spend their time studying the
Torah, or so they say.
As to those who support the administration, they paint a
picture of the country that will come to look like a society of moral people
who consider the benefits of ObamaCare as a kind of temporary stipend they will
use to buy time during which they will improve themselves, thus add to their
chances at success. And when this will be achieved, they will go from there to
better and grander things which will also be good for the country.
So the question is this: While recognizing that all sorts of
people exist who behave in all sorts of ways in every society, where on that
spectrum does the average American stand now, and will stand 10 years from now?
When answering a question of this nature, the safest way to approach the
subject is to look at history, and try to identify the closest analogy to the
current situation that we can find. In this regard, what comes to mind is the
phenomenon known as the creation of surpluses.
The best moment in history to illustrate the power of that
phenomenon is the time when nomadic people settled on the land and became
farmers. All of a sudden, only a portion of the population was needed to
produce the food that would feed the entire tribe. And this is because each
pair of hands was able to produce a surplus that fed someone else, someone that
went on to learn new things such as the crafts, and teach them to others. This
is how societies progressed generation after generation to reach a point where
we now send probes traveling through interstellar space.
Yes, there were loafers who took advantage of the situation
and lived by the sweat of others, but would we give up all that progress to
make sure that such people are denied the little that they receive without
contributing an equal amount? And what about those who could no longer
contribute because of circumstances that were not of their making but were kept
alive because there was a surplus to sustain them. Many of these people being
the oldest members, and the wisest of the tribe, they took the time to transfer
their knowledge and their wisdom to the younger generations.
And so, we can only conclude that if both sides in the
American debate would cool it a little, and if they would probe the known facts
to see how they can help steer society toward the best use of the time that
will be liberated ahead of some people, they could probably add to the progress
of their country rather than make the phenomenon work against them – which is
what they are doing now.
These people too are expected to contribute positive ideas
to earn their salary, not just play the game of “trip me and I'll trip you”
while someone else is producing the surpluses that allow them to have a pretty
good life.