It is common progressive doctrine that equality of outcomes is a cultural imperative. It is socially just to progressives for people to have generally the same amount of wealth and similar economic conditions. It is the government’s responsibility to manage those outcomes.
Typically, these ideals have been a hallmark of the Left’s agenda. However, apparently the appeal for big government has spread beyond just progressive Democrats.
Economist Jeff Deist alerts us that many modern conservatives are now only nominally less statist than their progressive rivals. Few Republicans really support enhancing an opportunity society by abolishing income taxes and the IRS, repealing the Federal Reserve Act, or closing whole federal agencies.
The siren song of big government intervention to engineer outcomes seems irresistible to parts of the conservative movement, too. Both progressives and many conservatives are political idealists who only differ on the means to achieve the ideal of equal outcomes.
With government intervention becoming more acceptable, there is a crucial need now more than ever to expose an unresolvable economic and cultural tension that the progressive pursuit of the “ideal” creates. When politicians attempt to implement equal outcome policies, it frequently backfires, either failing or creating more problems than they solve.
Why do many policies fail despite good intentions? Ironically, it’s usually because the people government most wants to help do not follow what the government wants them to do, especially when it goes against their culture.
Government alone cannot effectively change culture.
Too often equal outcome champions lay the blame for inequality at the feet of discrimination. Instead, Thomas Sowell suggests that different groups have different values and concerns which produce unequal outcomes. That while ruling elites may desire equal outcomes, perhaps diverse groups really don’t, as expressed by their priorities. Sowell states, “There is no economic determinism. People choose what to spend their money on, and what to spend their time on. Cultures differ.”
Sowell cites his own upbringing in pre-World War II Harlem in the late 1930s. New York City had many public libraries, elite public high schools, and high quality, inexpensive city colleges. For Sowell and his neighbors, though, these literacy and education institutions may as well have not existed. Most people in Harlem didn’t know about these establishments, and if they did, few knew how to use them.
Unfortunately, for most in his black community, reading was not a priority. Sowell observed that there were highly intelligent youngsters in Harlem. Some of them were given a high quality education by family members who had left the ghetto and risen in life. Yet, when their education was complete, these same brilliant young people chose to return to the ghetto rather than pursue the greater economic opportunity that their education afforded them. It was what their culture valued.
In contrast, even the poorest of Jewish families in nearby neighborhoods valued literacy and education. When Jewish immigrants arrived in New York, they devoured the public education opportunities. As a result, many eventually left poorer neighborhoods and excelled into the higher ranks of the New York economy.
Idealists believe that if everyone had equal education there would be economic equality. It is assumed that better educated people have better paying jobs, even though scores of entrepreneurs without much formal education like Bill Gates, Mary Kay Ash, Rush Limbaugh, Rachel Ray, or Simon Cowell prove otherwise.
It isn’t just biology or discrimination that results in inequality. Sadly, often it is choice. A person has to be willing to sacrifice something of value to gain something of greater value, but what is considered valuable differs culturally.
The refusal of politicians to ignore these factors is a sure indicator of public policy that is unhinged from reality. When big government tries to change culture in a top-down approach through law or equal outcome policies, it usually only results in failure, inefficiency, and economic waste. It is crucial that we effectively promote the market, freedom of choice, and opportunity as the only proven way to a just society.
[Serenity Richardson is a senior at The King’s College in New York City studying Business Administration with a double minor in Politics and Pre-Law. Originally from Peachtree City, she graduated from McIntosh High School in 2010.]
