David Brooks Says I Don't Exist!

I've become accustomed to people in elite circles saying that I do not exist, as in "nobody saw the housing bubble," but it still hurts. Okay, excuse the self-indulgence, there is a point here.

In his column today, David Brooks notes that rent-seekers often benefit from government programs, then complains that:

"You would think that liberals would have a special incentive to root out rent-seeking. Yet this has not been a major priority. There is no Steve Jobs figure in American liberalism insisting that the designers keep government simple, elegant and user-friendly."

These books have not attracted much attention, I would be fairly certain that Brooks has never heard of either one. Some of this undoubtedly reflects my skills as a writer, but there is a deeper issue here.

The people who dominate what passes for "liberal" politics in the United States would have little interest in promoting the views expressed in these books. Would Robert Rubin and his Wall Street friends want to promote the argument that they got rich primarily because they could rely on too big to fail insurance provided at no cost by the government? Those who question the importance of Wall Street interests in the Democratic Party should note that making a fortune on Wall Street seems to be a pre-requisite for being chief of staff in the Obama administration.

Similarly, both books point out the enormous waste associated with patent and copyright protection. Patent protection for prescription drugs costs us more than $250 billion a year compared to having drugs sold in a free market. This is five times as much money as what is at stake with extending the Bush tax cuts to the richest two percent. But the Hollywood crew, another important base of funding support for the Democratic Party, have little interest in calling attention to the government interventions that keep their industry alive in its current form.

The books also note the protectionist barriers that make it difficult for foreign professionals (e.g. doctors, dentists, and lawyers) from competing with professionals in the United States. This ensures that these professionals will benefit from international trade, since the goods they buy (including trips to Europe) will be cheaper as a result of trade, while the services they sell will continue to command a high price. However, the professionals who design policy for the Democratic Party have little interest in calling attention to the barriers that protect the high pay that they and their family members enjoy.

In short, there are clear structural obstacles to those advancing an argument that we should restructure the government so that it does not redistribute income upward. Those who control the purse strings that finance politics and policy research and the institutions that dominate public debate (e.g. the New York Times, Washington Post, and National Public Radio) have a clear interest in not having this argument get a wide audience.

This is why David Brooks can tell his readers that there are no liberals who are trying to combat rent-seeking that redistributes income to the wealthy. His friends, in both parties, do their best to ensure that anyone making such arguments never gets heard.

(I should mention Jacob Hacker and Paul Pierson as two people who have made a similar argument to a somewhat larger audience.)

I hear ya, Dean.
written by cemmcs, January 10, 2012 6:00 AM

Keep up the good work!

Modesty
written by JSeydl, January 10, 2012 6:18 AM

Dean,

I think you're being a bit modest here. People read your stuff, and you're having a tremendous influence. You've changed the way I think about policy issues substantially. Keep up the great work.

Factotum
written by Robert W. Mann, January 10, 2012 6:48 AM

Let me be the third to reinforce you for your efforts. I am amazed at your strength of character saying over and over these things that need to be said even over the chatter of thoughtless imbecility available from many on higher perches. I appreciate your words and your two books. I hope that those of us out here each spread your words around as the level of comment out here needs them badly. Your staying power when confronted day in and day out by the howling of pundits gives me considerable courage. Thanks from the bottom of my heart.

Is Brooks a Stupid Liberal in Disguise?
written by izzatzo, January 10, 2012 7:33 AM

The people who dominate what passes for "liberal" politics in the United States would have little interest in promoting the views expressed in these books.

Brooks ignores Obama also
written by Robert Salzberg, January 10, 2012 7:45 AM

Dear Dr. Dean Baker,

Don't feel bad that Brooks ignored you, he also ignored President Obama.

Next Wednesday marks the one year anniversary of the executive order by President Obama for a top to bottom review of all existing regulations by all federal departments.

http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2011/01/18/improving-regulation-and-regulatory-review-executive-order

Brooks also ignores Obama's biggest victory for eliminating rent-seekers, the end of billions of dollars of subsidies to banks for student loans.

...
written by Kat, January 10, 2012 7:53 AM

These books have not attracted much attention, I would be fairly certain that Brooks has never heard of either one. Some of this undoubtedly reflects my skills as a writer, but there is a deeper issue here.

When I read The Conservative Nanny State I thought "If he ever gets tired of bashing his head against a wall, perhaps he could try his hand at some satirical fiction."
At any rate, writing skills are not a prerequisite for influence and success: http://www.amazon.com/World-Fl...246&sr=1-2

The language of redistribution
written by David B. Schuster, January 10, 2012 8:08 AM

Even though wealth has been redistributed upwards for the past thirty years, the Republican debates in New Hampshire were filled with "Obama is a socialist who wants to redistribute your money". The Brookses of the world like to present socialism as the ultimate evil. In the 1950's we had a Stalinesque purge that eliminated socialism/communism from the lexicon. But that was a long time ago and those words have made their way back into the debate. The world is not the way that David Brooks would like it to be.

...
written by Lee Hartmann, January 10, 2012 8:40 AM

Why don't you send one of those books to our Mr. Brooks? Waste of time and money, I suppose... but it might be worth a try.

Brooks: America's Most Skillful Propagandist
written by Steve, January 10, 2012 9:08 AM

Brooks is a propagandist, pure and simple. Every column is seeking to advance the conservative cause, whether by seeking to demoralize liberals, or conning people into thinking that someone like Santorum is the common person's friend. He often starts with a zombie lie, and then piles on more zombie lies. Every column purports to be about one thing, but really is about something else. Today's column is supposed to be advice to liberals. But what he is really saying is that only conservative ideas are valid and liberals should surrender and adopt them. And yet, he is "the liberals' favorite conservative.

...
written by sherparick, January 10, 2012 9:33 AM

Brooks was being a "concerned troll" here folks. He is well aware that what passes for "liberalism" in the popular press and the elite is a bunch of Wall Streeters, Movie Moguls, and media who have as much interest in New Deal or economic liberalism as the rest of the 1%, nada, as Dean points out. They are cultural "liberals" who, like to think themselves superior to the the rube out their living between the Hudson river and Beverly Hills. I am afraid this atttitude of unearned superiority and snobbery was on full display in the Brooks comment thread. The history of this, of how Liberalism became a perjorative instead of a proud badge is something I lived through and it the result of 3 things that happen in the mid 1960s to early 1970s. First, and primarily it was Vietnam. The U.S. Government lied, got into a terrible, morally dubious, (more dubious then just fighting communism and extending American Empire, but rather politicans craven fear that political opponents might use a turn away from war as a political attack - see today's attacks on Obama for not going to war with Iran), all under the banner of two Liberal Presidents. Then they turned against the war, and ever since "Liberal" has also meant "someone of questionable patriotism." This was the biggest wound. There there was the Civil Rights Movement Blacks, Asians, Hispanics, and Women, which was great Liberal triumph but left a lot of unhappy people whose privileges, no matter how unearned, were clipped. Finally, there was the urban crime explosion of the 1960 and 1970s and the Liberals were identified as "soft on crime." McGovern ran as a Liberal in 1972 and Nixon buried him, and ever since "Liberal" has also meant "loser." Which is why the most "Liberal" candidate in 1976, the late Mo Udall, started saying he was a "progressive."

I will say one thing for Ron Paul, he able to talk about disengagement from foreign wars in way that also touches American Patriotism and without indulging in a self-righteous Anti-Americanism (I am looking at you Glenn Greewald).

http://www.negativeoutlook.blogspot.com
written by Peter K., January 10, 2012 9:48 AM

@ sherpatrick

Ron Paul is an isolationist who doesn't care about what's happening outside the U.S. It's NIMBYism applied to foreign policy. His ideas about economics and the Federal Reserve are bat$%&* insane.

I'll agree about Vietnam and that Brooks is trolling (or even taunting Krugman and his supporters). Why don't people agree with liberals? Fact is Occupy Wall Streeters were willing to risk their necks and mix it up with the riot police while Tea Partiers went about their suburuban NIMBYism.

The country is split down the middle (which is why Democrats took the House, Senate and Presidency in 2008). As Gene Wilder says in Blazing Saddles: "these people are the common clay of the West ... you know, morons." Many people are stupid and selfish about economics and politics. To be charitable they're busy with their jobs and raising kids and living lives. They may be smart about their jobs or hobbies but are stupid about politics and economics, succumbing to platitudes like Obama's one about government having to tighten its belt. Brooks knows this and is taunting liberals. His Republicans gave him Santorum in Iowa. Why don't they listen to Brooks?

...
written by ComradeAnon, January 10, 2012 10:41 AM

Just watch so many people coming out of a grocery store. They are walking into a area where 4000 lb objects cross. Do they pay any attention to any of that? Nope. They, like Brooks and just about all of media, is unaware of what's happening 12 inches beyond their nose. Alas, I've moved from telling my kids that "most people aren't very bright" to "most people are idiots".

This liberal opposes rent seeking
written by NB, January 10, 2012 10:55 AM

Dean,
Maybe some "liberal" pundits don't oppose rent seeking, but many of us down here in the grass roots do. We oppose having military procurement policy dictated by the Boeings of this world, and we oppose health care laws that are written for the benefit of the Aetnas and Mercks of this world. Now if only we could produce politicians to advocate for our position that governmental power should be used for more noble ends than enriching the rich...

...
written by liberal, January 10, 2012 11:29 AM

Peter K. wrote,

Ron Paul is an isolationist who doesn't care about what's happening outside the U.S. It's NIMBYism applied to foreign policy.

That's just downright idiotic.

...
written by liberal, January 10, 2012 11:38 AM

NB wrote,

Maybe some "liberal" pundits don't oppose rent seeking, but many of us down here in the grass roots do.

That's not so clear.

The largest chunk of rent in the US is land rent. Yet if you bring up the idea that maybe property taxes (in particular, taxes on land value) should be increased, liberals (note well: I could myself as one) are quite likely to say "oh, this will put grandma out of her house," just as much as any other know-nothings on the topic.

Instead of lowering
written by joe, January 10, 2012 12:15 PM

protective barriers for doctors and lawyers, how about we put up barriers for other workers. I don't want to compete with foreigners who are willing to work for half the wages. I never bought into this whole 'protectionism is the devil' thing, all developed nations got that way by being protectionist.

Dean the Lorax :)
written by hitesh brahmbhatt, January 10, 2012 12:55 PM

>>I actually have been yelling at the top of my lungs for much of the last decade about how the government has been used by the wealthy to redistribute income upward

Let's hope there are some Trufula Trees left when this is all over ...

...
written by Eclectic Obsvr, January 10, 2012 1:34 PM

David Brooks like most conservative pundits don't actually worry about facts and data, they just make assertions and count on sympathetic audiences to believe they are true.

Brooks and others of his ilk are constantly defining what "liberals" are and believe without any shred of evidence.

The truth is that the public has been propagandized about "Government" for years. Government is no less efficient in similiar endeavors than private sector. The only difference is that public accountability runs through the political oversight and private accountability is often mismatched by economic resources.

Never Fear, You Exist!
written by Wisdom Seeker, January 10, 2012 5:59 PM

But what we need to combat bipartisan elite featherbedding isn't Liberalism or Conservatism, but Populism.

Thanks to the Great Recession and the bipartisan failure to do anything constructive about the consequences, there is a huge hunger for nonpartisan populist messages. Which is to say: There is a market. Thus, this is a business opportunity for someone to serve that market.

Find the people serving that market, and you will no longer be ignored, except by those who cling desperately to the elitists' self-delusions.

Loves upward income redistribution, thinking they benefit
written by Blissex, January 11, 2012 7:20 AM

«Even though wealth has been redistributed upwards for the past thirty years, the Republican debates in New Hampshire were filled with "Obama is a socialist who wants to redistribute your money".»

The big problem here is that the median voter, the people who are Obama's constituency, are very much in favour of upward redistribution.

Because they think that they are the biggest beneficiaries. The "middle class" see themselves as rentier landlords, and are delighted by upward redistribution from the working classes. They want higher rent, bigger tax-free capital gains, lower wages and lower welfare.

Voters, which are by and large the properties middle classes think that the 1% are their class allies, and the working and underclass their class enemies.

Accordingly Republicans accuse Obama of being a champion of the working and underclasses, and therefore to stop the upward redistribution.

That is indeed a false accusation. From an article by Nancy Drew on Obama's electoral strategy:

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2011/aug/18/what-were-they-thinking/
«It all goes back to the “shellacking” Obama took in the 2010 elections. The President’s political advisers studied the numbers and concluded that the voters wanted the government to spend less. This was an arguable interpretation.
Nevertheless, the political advisers believed that elections are decided by middle-of-the-road independent voters, and this group became the target for determining the policies of the next two years.
That explains a lot about the course the President has been taking this year. The political team’s reading of these voters was that to them, a dollar spent by government to create a job is a dollar wasted.
The only thing that carries weight with such swing voters, they decided — in another arguable proposition — is cutting spending.»

Many voters who overwhelmingly have jobs and property see very little to be gained from unemployment insurance, and are instead enthusiastic about more money being given to finance interests to drive asset prices higher, and vote accordingly and donate to candidates who protect them from the endless greed of the welfare profiteers.

Most of people on low incomes and the unemployed don't vote and virtually none donate to their candidates.

written by diesel, January 12, 2012 7:19 AM

Once again, Brooks thumbs his nose at "Liberals" for not being able to fix the mess created by the crooks who run this country. Look elsewhere for enlightenment since Brooks uses the terms "Liberal" and "government" ambiguously, interchanging the degenerate-cynical and generally-accepted meanings of the words (which is itself doubly cynical since this is the very ploy used by "conservatives" in their current triumph over "Liberalism").

...
written by Bravo, January 12, 2012 1:18 PM

This is why we love your work and your writing. Keep fighting the good fight.

I do think that you overstate the extent to which copyright is a wasteful system (not so much with patents, where I'm more inclined to agree with you), because copyright operates like a government-sanctioned VC model. It's true that there is something unseemly about the government spending money on (or in defense of) "bad business bets," but I don't think you've balanced your arguments with the Richard Caves "nobody knows" approach to copyright economics.

David Brooks Says I Don't Exist!

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