Something Digby said recently made me think we are going about the whole Social Security debate wrong. Instead of being defensive, we should recognize that it is really a great opportunity for us. Digby pointed out that, contrary to what the pinheads keep saying, the Democrats have, in fact, put forward an alternative to Bush's plan. It's called Social Security. It works great and we have lots of data to prove it. Social Security is perhaps the most successful government program in all of human history. And it is all ours. Republicans have always hated it and still do. If they want to keep bringing it up, I say great. Lets use this opportunity to remind people how great it is and, more importantly, why it works. Social security works for the same reason most liberal programs work. It is good economics. For a multitude of reasons, economics favors the big over the small. And only governments can provide the economic advantages of a big corporation to individual citizens.
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So how does economics favor the big over the small? There are 2 main ways. The first is economies of scale. The per item cost of doing something goes down the more times it is done. Imagine there is no government and you are in the supposedly enviable position of being able to keep all of your money. Think about education. If there were no schools, you could hire a private tutor for your children. That would be pretty expensive. If other people in your neighborhood had children the same age, you could have your children tutored together and share the cost. That would make it cheaper for everyone. With enough people joining in you could build school buildings and hire full-time teachers, all for much less cost to each family than hiring a tutor. And it keeps getting cheaper the more people join together. That is why we can afford public schools. They may not be perfect, but for a tiny fraction of each person's income, we have guaranteed access to education. Yes it is your money, but by combining it with everybody else's, you get the most bang for your buck. Pooled income is powerful. Strength in numbers. Teamwork. That is what Democrats believe in. Republican's believe people are better off acting alone. Unfortunately for them, economic selfishness is bad economics. Liberals recognize that it is much more efficient to use economies of scale to the benefit of individuals. The US government simply represents the organizational system that allows everyone in the country to pool their economic power.
There are many other examples. Go back to the Republcan Utopia of no government. Say you are concerned about terrorism and you want to do something about it. You could pay to train and hire one soldier/spy/missionary to go after Al Qaida. If you are very well off, this might cost less then half of your salary. It probably wouldn't do much good, but its something. Alternatively, you could get together with all the people in your neighborhood and, by pooling a third of everyone's salary, maybe you could hire some soldiers and buy a tank. Better, but still not much help. Now, think about pooling everyone in your whole city, and you can see that by combining more and more people's money, you can do more and more things with less and less cost. That is how we are able to afford the world's greatest military, and it costs only a fraction of everyone's income. And remember, the military is one of those government run programs that Republicans hate. The military is the ultimate example of the "strength in numbers" economic thinking that drives liberal programs. It works and the same logic applies to such wide-ranging areas as building roads, conducting research, or providing health care.
In addition to economies of scale, pooling risk is another way that big beats small. Pooling risk is really the basis of any insurance program. When you buy home-owners insurance, you are essentially pooling your risk of something happening to your house with everyone else who has bought the same insurance. If an insurance company is small, it is less efficient because they are more susceptible to chance. If a tornado wipes out several houses they insure, they may not be able pay everyone and they might have to go bankrupt. To protect against that, a small company will have to charge higher rates than a larger company that is able to pool risk over many more houses. Pooling more and more houses reduces the effect of rare events and makes the payouts more predictable. The US government can pool risk over the greatest number of people. That is why social security works. Social Security is a type of insurance and pooling everyone together makes it more efficient. If you were to try to provide your own retirement insurance you would have to account for how long you are going to live. Social Security doesn't have to worry about that because, with millions of people pooled together, it can work with very predictable averages. Furthermore, economies of scale mean that there is very little overhead in Social Security. Your money does not go to brokers making decisions about how to invest it. Nor does it go to buy another yacht for the CEO of an investment company. Social Security is Democratic teamwork at its best. Bush's plan for antisocial insecurity is Republican economic selfishness at its worst.
Republican hatred of Social Security is even more puzzling given that they do recognize the benefits of pooling risk in some cases. Bush wants small business's to be able to pool their health insurance costs to get the savings that large companies enjoy. Large companies enjoy savings because of pooled risk and economies of scale. Yet, if it is good for small companies to join together, why not let everyone in the country join together and make the insurance as efficient as possible? That is strength in numbers and that is what Democrats stand for. Ours is an economic strategy with a long history of success. Lets remind people of that.