General Discussion

Jeff In Milwaukee

(13,992 posts) Mon Jul 28, 2014, 10:21 AM Jul 2014

We've Seen This Before: The Ryan Plan

Note: I apologize for this thread having nothing at all to say about "50 Shades of Grey"

Among the terrible things one can say about the modern Republican Party is this: Paul Ryan is considered their leading intellectual. Ryan is at it again, with his new “intelligent conservative” ™ plan to reform entitlement spending.

The Ryan plan is based on that tired, old canard popular among movement conservatives that poor people somehow like being poor. That poor folks are enamored of skipping meals and getting their clothing from second-hand stores and that their lifestyle is so attractive that it requires an iron-clad contract to make them give it up.

Let’s summarize the Ryan plan. The first “fresh idea” from Paul Ryan is that anti-poverty programs should be converted into block grants and turned over to the states. This is, of course, totally unlike Ryan’s plan in 2012 that Medicare should be converted into block grants and turned over to the states. Not at all the same. Totally different. Like Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen - complete opposites.

So what’s up with the GOP infatuation with block grants? Just look at a map of the United States. As of this year, 27 states have Republican-controlled state assemblies, which would allow conservatives in those states to throw out the federal rulebook and create their own programs. And if you think for one minute that, say, the Alabama State Legislature won’t turn these funds over to “faith based” organizations that will in turn require recipients to listen to a short sermon before getting their school lunch vouchers, then you really haven’t been paying attention.

Block Grants give the GOP fifty opportunities, fifty bites at the apple, to do what they can’t get done in Washington.

The second “fresh idea” from Paul Ryan is that recipients of federal aid (flowing through the states) will sign “contracts” where they will agree identify specific actions a person must take (like finding a job) and sanctions that will kick in if the recipient fails to up his end. This isn’t a new idea, of course. We used to have a system like that in this country.

It was called “Indentured Servitude.”

You see, the Ryan plan stipulates that I have to get a job, and that if I don’t get one quickly enough, I’ll lose my federal support. Sounds reasonable enough, until you consider that the plan doesn’t say that I can wait until I find a job that pays a living wage or provides for health care or child care benefits. I have to take whatever crap job at whatever crap wage is available – and you can bet that employers who know that I’m desperate to get a job (any job) to keep my kid covered by Medicaid are going to take advantage of that.

And I’m not allowed to quit my job unless I have something else lined up – that would be breach of my “contract” with Paul Ryan. So if the boss is forcing me to work off the clock, requiring me to work under dangerous conditions, or just going old school and groping my ass in the stock room, I’m stuck with this job until I can find another crap job at another crap wage. If I can find one – as we know from the last recession, sometimes no amount of job hunting can get you a job.

This legislation should be titled “The Horrible Bosses Protection Act of 2014.”

Finally, there’s the insufferable paternalism of this plan, which should be enough for any decent human being to oppose it. I'm comfortably in the middle class, yet I get tax breaks for owning my house and for sending my kids to college. I get a tax break in that I pay lower taxes on income from my investments than I do income from my labor. All without a contract. All without my having to promise Paul Ryan that I’ll be a better person in the future.

And will Wal-Mart have to sign a contract before it gets its annual $7.8 billion in taxpayer subsidies? How about the oil companies, which are notorious for receiving billions annually in tax breaks and subsidies? Will they have to pinky swear with Paul Ryan that they’ll not work so hard to kill the environment?

Don’t hold your breath. But know this: According to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, 66% of tax expenditures (deductions, tax breaks and write-offs) go to the wealthiest 20% of our society. Including corporate tax breaks would make that figure even more wildly out of proportion.

But only poor people are so lazy that Paul Ryan, a guy who works only 113 days out of the year, needs to hold their feet to the fire. Only poor people are so unproductive that Paul Ryan, a member of the least productive Congress in American history, wants them to sign a contract. That’s right. The guy who has a do-nothing, part-time job for which he’s paid $174,000 per year (not including illegal campaign contributions and corporate junkets), thinks that America’s poor need to kiss his ring or starve in the street.

We've seen all of this before.