David Brooks, "The Piketty Phenomenon": Are David Brooks and Paul Krugman Marxists?

Question: Did David Brooks or Paul Krugman ever serve in the army? I don't know the answer, but I would guess that they did not. Relevance? Simple. The army is the one place where persons are forced to interact with others from different economic strata, particularly with the poor.

Whether by happenstance or design, both Brooks and Krugman have today written New York Times op-eds concerning Thomas Piketty's new book "Capital in the Twenty-First Century." Brooks, in his opinion piece entitled "The Piketty Phenomenon" (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/25/opinion/brooks-the-piketty-phenomenon.html?ref=opinion&_r=0), acknowledges that young professionals in coastal cities have little contact with the poor:

"If you are a young professional in a major city, you experience inequality firsthand. But the inequality you experience most acutely is not inequality down, toward the poor; it’s inequality up, toward the rich.

You go to fund-raisers or school functions and there are always hedge fund managers and private equity people around. You get more attention than them at parties, but your whole apartment could fit in their dining room. You struggle with tuition, but their kids go off on ski weekends. You wait in line at the post office, but they have staff to do it for them.

You see firsthand the explosion of wealth at the tippy-top. It really doesn’t help that you have to spend your days kissing up to the oligarchs and their foundations to finance your research, exhibition or favorite cause."

Enunciating what he understands to be Piketty's claim that inequality is "driven by hedge fund oligarchs" and declaring that a "global wealth tax is utopian," Brooks concludes:

"This is a moment when progressives have found their worldview and their agenda. This move opens up a huge opportunity for the rest of us in the center and on the right. First, acknowledge that the concentration of wealth is a concern with a beefed up inheritance tax.

Second, emphasize a contrasting agenda that will reward growth, saving and investment, not punish these things, the way Piketty would. Support progressive consumption taxes not a tax on capital. Third, emphasize that the historically proven way to reduce inequality is lifting people from the bottom with human capital reform, not pushing down the top. In short, counter angry progressivism with unifying uplift.

The reaction to Piketty is an amazing cultural phenomenon. But it says more about class rivalry within the educated classes than it does about how to really expand opportunity. Of course, this perspective could just be my own prejudice. When it comes to cultural analysis, I, like Piketty, am quasi-Marxist."

Brooks is a "quasi-Marxist"? Fascinating. I'm not a "quasi" anything. Most of the time, I'm pissed-off and tired.

On the other hand, Krugman, who once told us that "Occupy Wall Street is starting to look like an important event that might even eventually be seen as a turning point," seems more of a "closet" Marxist than a "quasi" Marxist (not that I care). Krugman, in his opinion piece entitled "The Piketty Panic" (http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/25/opinion/krugman-the-piketty-panic.html?hp&rref=opinion), tells us:

"The really striking thing about the debate so far is that the right seems unable to mount any kind of substantive counterattack to Mr. Piketty’s thesis. Instead, the response has been all about name-calling — in particular, claims that Mr. Piketty is a Marxist, and so is anyone who considers inequality of income and wealth an important issue.

. . . .

[W]hat’s really new about 'Capital' is the way it demolishes that most cherished of conservative myths, the insistence that we’re living in a meritocracy in which great wealth is earned and deserved.

. . . .

Now, the fact that apologists for America’s oligarchs are evidently at a loss for coherent arguments doesn’t mean that they are on the run politically. Money still talks — indeed, thanks in part to the Roberts court, it talks louder than ever. Still, ideas matter too, shaping both how we talk about society and, eventually, what we do. And the Piketty panic shows that the right has run out of ideas."

Yes, I think that inequality of income and wealth is an important issue, but sometimes I wonder if Krugman has run out of ideas beyond government stimulus spending. Is OWS still his answer for income inequality?

My recommendation: In addition to Brooks's "beefed up inheritance tax," I would also demand national service from all citizens, which could include the army, forcing young people from different economic backgrounds to come face to face and learn from one another. Added benefits: reduced unemployment and potential job training.

But why should multimillionaires Obama and Hillary support higher inheritance taxes? This could stand in the way of the future political campaigns of Natasha, Malia and Chelsea. Send Natasha and Malia (it's a little too late for a pregnant Chelsea) to the army? We all know that's not going to happen.

Piketty "Phenomenon" or "Panic"? Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn. Nor will a narcissistic West in another couple of months.

Paul Krugman, "America’s Unlevel Field": A Marxist Diatribe

And you thought that Pravda, the official organ of the Central Committee of the Communist Party until 1991, was dead?

In his latest New York Times manifesto entitled "America’s Unlevel Field" (http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/09/opinion/krugman-americas-unlevel-field.html?ref=opinion), Paul Krugman declares that America is the advanced country where it matters most who your parents are, and that the US government has failed to create equal opportunity. Krugman contends:

"The failure starts early: in America, the holes in the social safety net mean that both low-income mothers and their children are all too likely to suffer from poor nutrition and receive inadequate health care. It continues once children reach school age, where they encounter a system in which the affluent send their kids to good, well-financed public schools or, if they choose, to private schools, while less-advantaged children get a far worse education.

Once they reach college age, those who come from disadvantaged backgrounds are far less likely to go to college — and vastly less likely to go to a top-tier school — than those luckier in their parentage.

. . . .

And if children from our society’s lower rungs do manage to make it into a good college, the lack of financial support makes them far more likely to drop out than the children of the affluent, even if they have as much or more native ability."

Goodness gracious, what a horrible country the US has become! How can we possibly begin to remedy this self-perpetuating socioeconomic tragedy engineered by nefarious Republican toads?

Poor nutrition and inadequate health care? Let's make certain that "low-income mothers and their children" are given multiple vitamin pills. If they are not swallowed, both mothers and children will either be whipped or subjected to a three-hour long upbraiding from Michelle Obama. Given the choice, I would opt for the whipping.

Let's also prevent MacDonalds, Kentucky Fried Chicken, Domino's Pizza, Cap'n Crunch and Coca Cola from advertising on television. Cigarette advertising is banned from the airwaves, so let's also do away with junk food commercials, and that means Kristy Kreme doughnuts, too.

If the children become too fat or too skinny, let's take them from their mothers and send them away to federally funded nutrition farms, where their weights will be carefully monitored, and they will only eat organic vegetables. Mothers, of course, can visit after a strip search for offending chocolates.

Private schools? Let's eliminate them, or at least require that their student bodies reflect US demographics within a percentile. If a child is half African American and half Jewish, his or her identity will also be divided equally for purposes of meeting this new quota.

Top tier universities? No more! I propose a draft system similar to that found in professional sports, whereby the best new professors will be send to the worst schools, thereby raising their academic standards to those of Harvard, Yale and the University of Chicago. (Yes, Paul, you forced it out of me: I graduated from the University of Chicago, and I'm ready to be sent away to a gulag.)

Finally, given that talented college students from poor families are more likely to drop out than dumb children from affluent families, let's provide the poor families with a stipend in addition to that being received by their children.

And when these rich and poor students finally graduate with bachelor degrees in English literature and contemporary history, and they migrate to Zuccotti Park and mingle with others unable to find jobs, Paul Krugman will visit in order to proffer comfort as all rage in unison against the inequality of the system.