How Stimulating…

When the Great Recession hit, liberals and conservatives disagreed on the appropriate role of government. (“Yes,” I can hear you saying, “and the sun rose in the east…”). One of the bones of contention was the stimulus. While virtually all economists supported a stimulus, there were lots of arguments about its proper size, with Nobel Laureates like Paul Krugman and Joseph Stiglitz pressing for a larger amount than the Republicans in Congress would authorize.

As we have begun the slow and decidedly unsteady climb out of the economic abyss, there have been even more vociferous arguments about the stimulus’ effect. Economists of all ideological persuasions agree that things would have been much worse without it, but conservatives have continued to pooh-pooh its importance to the economic recovery.

If the stimulus’ effect really was less robust than predicted, I now have one theory about why.

Bear with me.

Yesterday’s post was about the substantial “reversion” of money from the Department of Children’s Services at a time when the agency was underfunded, understaffed and ultimately unable to save the lives of 26 abused children.  Reversions are budgeted but unspent amounts that an agency sends back to the state’s general fund. A friend who works on policy issues for a major nonprofit shared the full list of reversions for fiscal year 2011-12. The total was a staggering $670,931,548.98.

Some of the amounts unspent seemed reasonable–after all, budget figures are “guestimates.” Others were eyebrow-raising: juvenile justice and violent crime administration returned half a million. The Department of Health and its various programs returned six and a half million dollars that weren’t spent making Hoosiers healthier.

FSSA–the agency charged with responsibility for our most vulnerable populations–returned a whopping $47,643,955 to the general fund. The Department of Environmental Management was close behind, at $38,860,038. (What’s a little environmental degradation among friends??) After those two, Education’s reversion looked positively skimpy at $7, 302,510.

What do these reversions have to do with the stimulus, you ask?

According to friends with knowledge of the arcana of state fiscal matters, the Administration used portions of its stimulus funds to replace state monies budgeted for service delivery. This was illegal, but people I trust, knowledgable people with no reason to lie, assure me it happened. The agencies then “reverted” the replaced monies back to the state, allowing the Governor to brag about his budgetary prowess and return that all-important $100 each to Indiana taxpayers.

The reason such shenanigans are illegal should be obvious–if stimulus funds are used to replace dollars that are going to be spent anyway, they aren’t going to “stimulate” anything. Given the complexity and lack of transparency of state budgetary processes, my informants say, the likelihood of being caught was remote. The political reward was worth the risk.

Caveat here: I am not a budget wonk–I am admittedly incapable of the sort of analysis needed to confirm these charges. It is certainly possible my sources are wrong.

If they are wrong, however, we are left with an explanation that is even worse.

Either the administration misused stimulus funds and reduced their effectiveness, delaying the recovery and keeping many Hoosiers unemployed, or it deliberately refused to spend money that had been budgeted for education, health and the environment, piling up surpluses while failing to meet the needs of children and our most vulnerable citizens.

No matter which explanation is right, what we are left with is very, very wrong.

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The Golden Mean

I’ve been on IUPUI’s faculty for nearly 15 years, and for the very first time, faculty offices are scheduled for repainting and (gasp!) new furniture. Since the desk I’ve used since I arrived has seen nearly as many birthdays as I have, I welcome the change.

The downside is that we all have to box up our books, files, pictures and the like so the movers can do their thing, and it is amazing–and daunting–to realize just how much…stuff…(aka crap) one can accumulate in 15 years. It’s particularly sobering to realize how seldom that crap gets consulted.

I did come across some interesting reading as I was weeding out my files of “background information.” Case in point, an essay by Benjamin Barber titled “A Failure of Democracy, Not Capitalism,” remarking on the passage of an anti-corporate-corruption measure in 2002. As Barber pointed out,

“..business malfeasance is the consequence neither of systemic capitalist contradictions nor private sin, which are endemic to capitalism and, indeed, to humanity. It arises from a failure of the instruments of democracy, which have been weakened by three decades of market fundamentalism, privatization ideology and resentment of government.”

Bingo.

Fundamentalism is problematic in all areas of national life, not just the economic sphere. As attractive as either-or formulations and beliefs may be–and let’s face it, possession of THE truth, THE answer, is undeniably seductive–such hard and fast, one-size-fits-all approaches just don’t work in the real world.  Unfortunately for market fundamentalists, capitalism requires regulation to ensure an even playing field; unfortunately for proponents of central government control, those regulations need to be carefully calibrated–too much is as bad as too little.

There are areas of our common life that require “socialism”–the communal provision of services like police and fire protection, sanitary sewers and roads, to give a few examples. There are other areas where government needs to tread lightly–retail sales, manufacturing, and other entreprenuerial activities requiring relatively minor rules protecting public health and safety. The level of government activity should depend upon the nature of the activity rather than rigid ideology.

The regulatory failures of the past decades have–predictably–spawned a movement intent upon “replacing capitalism.” Americans tend to lurch from one fundamentalism to another, and we don’t seem to recognize that such pendulum swings are unhelpful. Barber’s insight remains an important one; we don’t need to give up capitalism, which has served us well overall. We just need social and legal structures that channel its energies and control its corrupting tendencies.

The Greeks had it right when they advocated for the golden mean.

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Father’s Day

In about an hour, my husband and I will start getting dressed for a Father’s Day brunch with four of our five children–number five, who lives in Manhattan, will be missing in person but with us in spirit.

There are many things one can say about the role of fathers or stepfathers in the lives of their children, and we will hear many of them today, if for no other reason than the fact the media will bombard us with Father’s Day sentiments. But I was struck this morning reading remarks made by Newark Mayor Cory Booker to the graduating class at Bard College. Booker–who is one of the truly impressive public servants of our time–shared a contemplation on the wisdom of his father, and I think it is well worth sharing.

“My dad would always tease me: ‘Boy, don’t you walk around here like you hit a triple. You were born on third base, boy.’ ..I drink deeply from wells of freedom and liberty that I did not dig. I eat lavishly from banquet tables prepared for me by my ancestors. I sit under the shadow of trees that were planted and cultivated and cared for by those who I will never know.”

The really good fathers, the ones who make a lasting difference, are the good citizens who–without celebrity or fanfare–protect our liberties, participate in building our communities, and plant trees under which they will never sit, trees that will shadow their children and grandchildren. Those really good fathers raise children who acknowledge their debt to those who have plowed the ground they plant, and accept their own obligation to “pay it forward.”

Our children have been blessed to have a father/stepfather like that.

Have a great Father’s Day.

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Deja Vu All Over Again

Later today, I am participating in a discussion at the Indianapolis Interfaith Center on Shari’a Law. Given the current hostility to Islam, and its usefulness for some as a wedge issue, the presentations should be interesting.

When I first became aware of the passage of state laws prohibiting courts from applying Sharia law, my first reaction was “it’s déjà vu all over again.”  I grew up Jewish in Anderson, Indiana. There were a total of 30 Jewish families in Anderson, and growing up I fielded questions like “do Jews have tails?” and “do Jews live in houses like ‘real’ people?” Less naïve—and nastier—comments assumed Jews’ dual loyalty—and implicitly, that our commitment to Israel would trump our allegiance to the United States. Essentially, these folks were sure Jews constituted a disloyal “fifth column,” not to be trusted.

It hasn’t only been Jews who were subject to these suspicions. I was in college during JFK’s campaign for President, and several people explained to me that if he won, the Pope would rule America, that Catholicism was incompatible with Americanism, and that Catholics were amassing weapons in church basements. (They never said whether those weapons would be used if Kennedy won or lost…)

More recently, we’ve all heard the anti-immigrant rhetoric about Latinos. “They” won’t learn our language, “they” will change America’s culture. (No one seems all that angry about Canadians).

It’s probably human nature to fear and demonize the “other.” My son-in-law’s mother, who lives in northern England, has a friend who doesn’t trust “those people” from outside Yorkshire. When my husband’s pocket was picked in Spain, a nice man from Barcelona explained that it was undoubtedly the work of the Moroccans. But whatever evolutionary benefits such instincts conferred on us humans in the past, these fears of people who don’t look or act or believe like us have really become counter-productive.

My own history with this constant suspicion of “otherness” informs the perspective I bring to the silly anti-Sharia laws popping up around the country. Those laws typically prohibit the use of Sharia (or often simply “foreign”) law in our courts. I am firmly convinced that, in addition to the obvious bigotry/jingoism, widespread civic illiteracy goes a long way toward explaining passage of these measures.

If there is one thing I have learned after 14 years of teaching law and policy, it is that this country faces a frightening deficit of knowledge about our governing institutions. This is another example. The people agitating for these laws and the legislators who pass them have no idea what courts do, or how law works.

If I die leaving instructions to divide my estate in accordance with Islamic law, are the Courts forbidden to enforce my will? If I enter into a contract with someone from France and we both agree that French law will govern any disputes that arise, must American courts ignore our agreement? If orthodox Jews voluntarily take a dispute to the Beth Din–a Jewish arbitration tribunal–shouldn’t American courts enforce that tribunal’s decision in the same way that they routinely enforce the increasing numbers of business arbitrations?

The First Amendment’s Free Exercise Clause requires American courts to abstain from deciding purely religious disputes; they will not take jurisdiction over arguments growing out of religious doctrine, for example. And religious belief cannot successfully be used as a defense in cases where American laws have been broken. “God wanted me to blow up that building” doesn’t cut it in a court of law, no matter whose God we’re talking about.

The passage of legislation to prevent the “imposition” of Sharia law rests on profound misunderstanding of the operation of law and the role of the courts.

Of course, these measures are also a great example of the “elephant” story we’ve all heard: a man is sitting in his living room making weird circles in the air. Someone asks him what he’s doing. “Keeping the elephants away.” The questioner protests, “But there are no elephants”–to which the man responds triumphantly, “See. It works!”

During my own lifetime, I’ve seen American society get over its fear of Jews and Catholics and various “others,” and I have some confidence that we’ll live through the hysteria over Muslims aka “Islamic terrorists.” But a little civic literacy and common sense–and a little less “deja vu”– would be very welcome right now.

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Hastening Mortality

Today is Memorial Day.

Usually, I don’t spend as much time as I should pondering the sacrifices of the men and women we are memorializing; like most Americans, I welcome a three-day weekend and perhaps, as this year, a cookout with my children and grandchildren. This Memorial Day, however, a death in my own family has me contemplating not just our inevitable mortality, but the numerous human behaviors that hasten the inevitable.

Today, of course, the national focus is on war, and the loss of young men and women in the very primes of their lives. As a parent, I can’t begin to imagine the pain of losing a child, especially in war. Wondering if he suffered at the end, wondering what sort of life she might have lived had she survived. As a member of society, I can only wonder what sorts of contributions to the common good we’ve gone without–what budding artist or inventor or entrepreneur was lost to us through combat.

Wars are not all avoidable; there are just wars. But those unavoidable conflicts are few and far between. The wars of choice, the wars begun by small men with big delusions, by impatient men unwilling to engage in diplomatic problem-solving, have cost so many precious lives that didn’t need to be lost.

It isn’t only through war that we hasten our own demise, of course.  We humans participate in a veritable shmorgasbord of self-destructive behaviors.

The cousin who died yesterday was a bright, delightful, witty woman. (I still remember one conversation about an elderly aunt and uncle who were divorcing after some 50 years of marriage. When I wondered “why now?” she shot back “They were waiting for the children to die.”) Everyone loved Ann–she was classy and warm and outgoing. But even though she knew better, she smoked. Like a chimney. Eventually, she developed lung cancer that metastasized to her brain. It isn’t a pleasant way to go.

So many of us are like my cousin; we can’t seem to break behaviors we know are bad for us. We smoke, we overeat, we drink to excess, we drink and drive….We start wars. We get really good at rationalizing self-destructive, often suicidal behaviors.

On this Memorial Day, I’m wondering what it is about the human condition that makes so many of us act in ways that hasten the inevitable–and what, if anything, we can do about it.

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