Subtlety? We don’t do subtlety. We’re Americans.
We’re not particularly good at nuance, either. There’s a reason the acronym KISS originated here.
Keep It Simple, Stupid.
Sometime in the next couple of weeks, tens of millions of of Americans will receive checks from the government, whether they need them or not. They’re mistakenly being called stimulus checks, even though the economy doesn’t need to be stimulated.
That’s where the KISS part comes into play. If it’s called a stimulus, it’s easy to send checks to everyone up to a certain income level and not ask any questions about what’s fair.
But what it really is, is a rescue. Many people have lost their jobs and fallen behind on their bills, including rents and mortgages. Without a rescue, they’ll be in a mess they may never escape.
Meanwhile, as happens in most times of economic upheaval, the rich get richer. That’s never going to change until we return income-tax rates to what they were before Ronald Reagan.
But that’s a topic for another day.
I have no problem giving money to people who have been hurt by the pandemic, and I love the idea of the additional tax breaks for families with children. This might surprise you to learn, but we do less for children in this country than any of the free European nations do.
Ever wonder why?
In most Western European nations, parents receive subsidies from the government to help provide for their children. My lovely wife explained to me that’s because children are considered the treasure of the country.
In America?
We think parents own their children.
It’s depressing how we punish children for having bad parents. If you were to take the same kid and put him in two different situations — middle-class suburbia and two parents or poor white Appalachia with one parent barely getting by. you would get very different results.
Even in two similar middle-class homes, one seemingly minor difference can make a huge difference in the long run.
Are there books in the home?
Do the parents value reading and teach their children to love books?
We taught our children to love reading, and both of them have become intelligent, informed and successful adults. Both have great careers and have executive-level jobs heading into middle age. Neither of them have been affected financially by the pandemic, and neither have my wife and I.
And that’s sort of the point of this story. As retirees, Nicole and I have received exactly the same income all through the pandemic as we did before. People might say, oh, but you’re on a fixed income. Well, the “fixed” part of it doesn’t matter. What matters is the level it’s fixed at.
We’re not rich, but we own our home outright and in fact have no debts of any kind. And when we decided to go to Virginia next month, we didn’t have any problem paying extra for first class and a safer journey.
We received the checks for the first stimulus, complete with the ego-tripper’s name on them.
Trump, not me.
We didn’t get the smaller second ones, and I have no idea why. Didn’t bother me.
We’ll probably get the next one — our income was well under $150,000 — but to me from a national standpoint, it’s a waste of money. If we get $2,800, we’re not going to go out and spend it. At least not till the pandemic is over.
Oh, well.
That’s America.