Imagine that you are an unborn spirit
in heaven. God condemns you to a life of poverty but will permit you to choose
the country in which you will spend your life. Which country would you choose?
I would choose the United States of America.
A
recent study by Just Facts, an excellent source of factual information, shows
that after accounting for income, charity and noncash welfare benefits such as
subsidized health care, housing, food stamps and other assistance programs,
“the poorest 20% of Americans consume more goods and services than the national
averages for all people in the world’s most affluent countries.” This includes
the majority of countries that are members of Organization for Economic
Co-operation and Development, including its European members. The Just Facts
study concludes that if the U.S. “poor” were a nation, then it would be one of
the world’s richest.
As early as 2010, 43% of all
poor households owned their own homes. The average home owned by persons
classified as poor by the Census Bureau is a three-bedroom house with
one-and-a-half baths, a garage and a porch or patio. Eighty percent of poor
households have air conditioning. The typical poor American has more living
space than the average non-poor individual living in Paris, London, Vienna,
Athens and other cities throughout Europe. Ninety-seven percent of poor
households have one or more color televisions — half of which are connected to
cable, satellite or a streaming service. Some 82% of poor families have one or
more smartphones. Eighty-nine percent own microwave ovens and more than a third
have an automatic dishwasher. Most poor families have a car or truck and 43%
own two or more vehicles.
Most
surveys on U.S. poverty are deeply flawed because poor households greatly
underreport both their income and noncash benefits such as health care benefits
provided by Medicaid, free clinics and the Children’s Health Insurance Program,
nourishment provided by food stamps, school lunches, school breakfasts, soup
kitchens, food pantries, the Women, Infants & Children Program and homeless
shelters.
We hear and read stories such
as “Real Wage Growth Is Actually Falling” and “Since 2000 Wage Growth Has
Barely Grown.” But we should not believe it. Ask yourself, “What is the
total compensation that I receive from my employer?” If you
included only your money wages, you would be off the mark anywhere between 30%
and 38%. Total employee compensation includes mandated employer expenses such
as Social Security and Medicare. Other employee benefits include retirement and
health care benefits as well as life insurance, short-term and long-term
disability insurance, vacation leave, tuition reimbursement and bonuses. There
is incentive for people to want more of their compensation in a noncash form
simply because of the different tax treatment. The bottom line is that prior to
the government shutdown of our economy in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic,
Americans were becoming richer and richer. The question before us now is how to
get back on that path.
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Speaking of the COVID-19 pandemic, Just Facts has a couple of
interesting takes in an article by its co-founder James D. Agresti and Dr.
Andrew Glen titled “Anxiety From Reactions to Covid-19 Will Destroy At Least
Seven Times More Years of Life Than Can Be Saved by Lockdowns.”
Scientific surveys of U.S. residents
have found that the mental health of about one-third to one-half of all adults
has been substantially compromised by government reactions to the COVID-19
pandemic. There are deaths from non-psychological causes, such as
government-mandated and personal decisions to delay medical care, which has
postponed tumor removals, cancer screenings, heart surgeries and treatments for
other ailments that could lead to early death if not addressed in a timely
manner. Interesting and sadly enough, New York state enacted one of the
strictest lockdowns in the U.S. but has 22 times the death rate of Florida,
which had one of the mildest lockdowns.
As I pointed out in a recent column,
intelligent decision-making requires one to not only pay attention to the
benefits of an action but to its costs as well.
Walter
E. Williams is the John M. Olin distinguished professor of economics at George
Mason University, and a nationally syndicated columnist. To find out more about
Walter E. Williams and read features by other Creators Syndicate columnists and
cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate web page.
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