January 26, 2004
BE GLORIOUS, DAMN YOU!
Kill Yuppie Scum The backlash against neoliberalism (John Derbyshire, NRO, 1/26/04)
The story of the past quarter-century — a convenient starting marker would be the election of Margaret Thatcher on May 3, 1979 [footnote omitted] — has been the triumph of what is loosely called neoliberalism, a belief in open markets with minimal restraints on trade between nations, free movements of peoples, and the dismantling of huge state-owned enterprises and regulatory bodies. This has been a very wonderful thing, and I shouldn't like to leave you with any misunderstanding as to how I feel about it. I am old enough to remember the previous regime, at least in England, and believe me, neoliberalism is way better than what went before.I very much like John Derbyshire. His occassional essays for National Review and NRO are pithy and even elegant. His Calvin Coolidge novel is excellent. I very much want to read his mathematics book, though I have no interest in the subject matter. When it comes to the beauty of of prime numbers, I am as a blind man in a convention of the deaf.As is the nature of all human things, though, the new synthesis has generated a new antithesis. Neoliberalism has its dark side. When neoliberalism was first promoted in China by Deng Xiaoping, it was launched with the slogan: "To get rich is glorious!" So, indeed, it must have seemed to the cowed, brutalized survivors of Mao Tse-tung's 30-year experiment in egalitarian communism. And so it is: Personal wealth produces a great deal of vulgar display and vapid hedonism, but it also patronizes great art, gives the leisure for public service, and supplies the wherewithal for works of charity.
The dark side of neoliberalism is inequality. Every country that has embraced the new order has seen the gap between rich and poor grow wider. Not all of us have entrepreneurial talents; not all of us — very few of us, in fact — have the ability to get rich. Now of course, a rising tide lifts all boats, and the neoliberal order has blessed not only those who enriched themselves, but hundreds of millions of others, too. Not only has it lifted us up, it has supplied us with a plethora of goods and services that did not exist 30 years ago, and that would never have been brought into existence by any state-managed bureaucracy, or any Dictatorship of the Proletariat, or any of those labor-industry-government partnerships so fondly imagined by leftist economists of the 1970s.
But what the heck is he talking about. He doesn't want us to mistake his love of neoliberalism, one of the crowning achievements of which is the free movement of people. Well, gee, John, how could we have come to make that mistake? (Tangentially, hasn't it been fun these last few weeks to watch NRO lambast the President for his immigration plan, on the one hand, and argue that conservatives must support him, on the other?)
Like many conservatives, Mr. Derbyshire is uncomfortable with democratic capitalism. In this, his name is nicely poetic. Like Tolkien, he harks back wistfully to the way things (never) were when happy little Englanders lived their preindustrial lives like the hobbits in their Shire. It's too bad, we can hear him grumble, that freedom leads inexorably to Donald Trump. And, of course, it is unfortunate, but would he be any happier if he as carefully watched how any of us spend our money. For that matter, do conservatives really like to see more money being frittered away on modern art, or the hallways of power being stocked with the leisured rich, or the creation of more mega-foundations, spending the wealth of the Fords, Rockefellers and Carnegies? Have we all become such socialists that we take for granted our right to an opinion on what other people do with their property?
If so, we should be sobered by Mr. Derbyshire's timely demonstration of where this notion leads as he attacks neoliberalism's downside: income inequality. First, says who? In the United States at the moment, income inequality is largely, though apparently not solely, caused by immigration. [The preceding sentence was changed. See the comments. DGC] We're importing poor people, because we're just not making any of our own, any more. The rich certainly are richer than they've ever been, but so are the poor. I doubt that he would argue that actual economic inequality is greater in the West than it was under Communism. Second, so what? Income equality isn't a good thing. Depending upon how ruthless the government is, it is either a pipe dream or the excuse for great evil. If political rights belong to everyone equally, why does "justice" have anything to say about the distribution of income (not wealth, by the way) at some particular point in time. I've never been poorer than when I was in college, but any compassion spent on me then would have been wasted.
Freedom is freedom; the idea that it should be curtailed if we don't like where people choose to go led to the worst of the last century. This is where Mr. Derbyshire goes wrong. He implicitly accepts the centrality of the state in modern life. Our safeguard from excess and depravity is not the state, but can only be a culture that rejects excess and depravity. Political freedom can only survive if the greater nation, expressing itself not through the police or regulation, but through censure and shame, limits our choices by limiting what we choose, not what we are free to choose. The alternative is the freedom of license, which, damaging in itself, will be followed by repression.
Thus, the importance of religion in the United States. Religion says that the rich man and the poor man are equal in the sight of G-d. From this flows our idea of the importance of political equality. Religion says that man has been given free will and can use it even to disobey his Creator. From this flows our idea of freedom. Religion says that man has an inherent dignity. From this flows our idea of inalienable rights. Religion says that man is imperfect and not perfectable. From this flows our idea of limited government and our skepticism of efficient government.
Liberals often ask what is it that conservatives wish to conserve? It is this culture, which teaches that the measure of a man is how he acts, not what he earns or buys.
Posted by David Cohen at January 26, 2004 3:43 PMDidn't religion say that a man's personal success here on Earth was a sign of his salvation status, the rich being the Elect for whom God has granted salvation, and the poor being the non-Elect, for whom salvation was denied?
Posted by: Robert D at January 26, 2004 6:15 PMIANAC, but: Let's say you believe that salvation comes only through grace, and not through works. That is, you believe that all people are irredeemably fallen and no person merits salvation. Then salvation becomes a gift from G-d and their can be no rational basis for it. This is, dramatically oversimplied, orthodox Christianity.
Now, most Christians believe that accepting Christ as their Savior leads to salvation and that Christ is the only road to salvation, but not all Christians believe this. Some hold that a small portion of believers -- the elect -- are predestined to be saved and the rest of us, including most of their coreligionists, are damned. The next question becomes whether the elect (otherwise, the Saints) can be recognized in this life. As far as I know, in mainstream Christian sects (or as mainstream as this sort of predestination ever is) the answer is no. Some did believe (and this mostly a premodern belief system) that whether someone was rich or otherwise blessed in life was indicative of membership in the elect, but there was never any necessary one-to-one relation.
Posted by: David Cohen at January 26, 2004 6:59 PMRobert D - Jesus explicitly repudiated that view, see for instance Luke 13:1-5.
Posted by: pj at January 26, 2004 7:33 PMDavid-- I totally agree with your post, except for this:
In the United States at the moment, income inequality only grows because of immigration.
Unfortunately, this is simply untrue. I recommend this article from the biz section of Sunday's New York Times, "Time to Slay the Inequality Myth? Not So Fast".
Otherwise I have no complaints.
Posted by: Charlie Murtaugh at January 26, 2004 9:00 PMA question about that article: its data is based on housholders born in the US--but even 2nd generation immigrants have a harder time than, say, 3rd or 4th. So the claim could still be legitimately made that immigration is what is causing the bulk of the inequality, though I have no hard data to back it up.
That said, I can't see how inequality could possibly not happen in a society getting richer. After all, there is no ceiling on how wealthy one can be, but there certainly is a floor. Doesn't that necessitate a rising inequality along with rising wealth, even if actual standard of living is rising for everyone?
Posted by: Timothy at January 26, 2004 9:21 PMOK, just wanted to be sure which Religion with a capital R we were talking about.
Apart from your statements about Religion (there is no capital R Religion, there are many small r religions in the US, and they are all over the map on the question)I agree with your critique of Derbyshire. The obsession with wealth disparity is more about social disparity than material well-being. All this kind of carping does is instigate dissatisfaction and resentment in people who generally should feel quite good about themselves, and lucky to be living in the age and country that they are. This is the best time and place to be an average schmo than any other time and place in history.
Posted by: Robert D at January 26, 2004 9:24 PMAmen, brother.
Posted by: David Cohen at January 26, 2004 9:47 PM"All this kind of carping does is instigate dissatisfaction and resentment in people who generally should feel quite good about themselves, and lucky to be living in the age and country that they are. This is the best time and place to be an average schmo than any other time and place in history."
I do not think that there is any reason to believe that anybody in the United States, outside of the chattering classes, is the least bit interested in income distribution. As for the CCer's, their gripe is that the country is no longer much interested in their exquisite opinions. They think to themseleves: "What if we take away their toys and make them sit still and listen to us?"
Posted by: Robert Schwartz at January 27, 2004 1:47 AMI disagree, Robert. We're all very concerned with income redistribution. We all just happen to think it ought to be redistributed to ourselves. And most of us have decided that, unfortunately, the best way to do so is probably to get a job.
Which reminds me. I really should do that.
Posted by: Timothy at January 27, 2004 2:46 AMArticles like these tend to reinforce the perception that there is indeed a direct, straightline correlation between wealth and success, and I think that may be behind some of Derbyshire's apologetic tone. In fact, in a free society, many will choose livelihoods that have little chance of leading to wealth, and thank goodness for that. Traditional vocations like holy orders, the military and teaching don't result in millionaires. Same for nurses, artists, social workers, police, and bureaucrats generally (and, yes, we do need those, just not so many).
But the main vocation that appears to conflict more and more with wealth is family, and I think this is quite recent. The connection between material success and virtues like duty, reverance, frugality and sobriety is becoming more and more tenuous in the public mind. In the 50's corporations preferred family men because it was assumed these virtues would bemefit the company. Not so during the frantic high-tech 90's bubble when a hundred hour/week frantic mad dash to the public offering was the standard. Family obligations were an irritating drag.
All of which I think reinforces David's point about the importance of religion. That, not jelousy and taxation, will lead to prosperity and keep Mammon in check.
Posted by: Peter B at January 27, 2004 6:12 AMI suppose "Religion" could be the deracinated American civil religion, subscription to which is implicit in being an American.
Some of the characteristics of this Religion are:
A belief in one nonsectarian god, somewhat detached but benign -- a less jolly Santa Claus -- whose favorite children Americans are.
A tendancy to confuse the Ten Commandments with the Bill of Rights.
A corps of devinely inspired Saints, referred to as the Founders but including some who lived long after the founding (e.g., Lincoln, Dr. King).
A small "p" protestant approach to the relationship between god and man.
A conviction that no American is without dignity and some measure of good.
Nonjudgmentalism.
A horror of making other Americans feel bad.
The submission of morality to the views of the majority.
Evangelism.
Posted by: David Cohen at January 27, 2004 9:13 AMDerbyshire is getting to be the crazy aunt of the NRO Corner. He's an admitted racist who dreams about a bucolic neverland with no blacks and dark-skinned Hispanics to offend him. In the Corner yesterday he was waxing poetic about Americans (minus blacks and Hispanics) picking fruit and raising barns and draining swamps and doing other manual work Derbyshire never does himself. Derbyshire types on a keyboard for his living, of course.
Jonah Goldberg has come closest to challenging his racism on the immigration issue. Jonah admitted some conservatives screeched over the Bush immigration speech from racist motives. He gave as an example...Pat Buchanan. He must have longed to type "John Derbyshire" instead.
At least he pointedly refused to exempt Derbyhsire from the ranks of the racists, as he did with Ramesh Ponnuru.
I don't want NRO to fire Derbyshire, as Andrew Sullivan has urged. But it would be nice if somebody argued with him a little when he goes off his meds and starts one of his crazier rants.
Posted by: Casey Abell at January 27, 2004 9:47 AMDavid, with a few tweaks, I would subsrcibe to your definition of the American religion. If I had to name my religion, it would be Americanism.
That is great, David. Would you include the belief that everybody in the world will behave nicely if treated nicely?
Posted by: Peter B at January 27, 2004 12:34 PMPeter -- I'm not making fun. I think that, to a greater or lesser extent, all Americans either believe these things or wish they could.
As for the rest of the world, we don't take them into account in our religion. Americanism is sort of like the religion they would have in Heaven. Others are welcome, if they can get in, but it's not really for the people in Hell or even, like you, Purgatory, other than we wish you all would just get it together and act like us.
Posted by: David Cohen at January 27, 2004 4:18 PMI didn't think you were making fun. Like Robert, I think it is a heck of a faith. I just hope you hold open services.
Posted by: Peter B at January 27, 2004 4:58 PMWe're fighting that out right now. OJ and I want to throw the doors open to all comers. Others seem to think that we should not only stop all conversions, but need to kick out some people who have been attending services without benefit of baptism.
Posted by: David Cohen at January 27, 2004 6:26 PM"..we wish you all would just get it together and act like us."
You wonder why Mexico hasn't been able to do this yet, for all their closeness to us and the huge number of their citizens who have studied the ways of our church.
Posted by: Robert D at January 27, 2004 8:16 PMNext year in Encino.
Posted by: David Cohen at January 27, 2004 9:07 PM