{"id":13306,"date":"2013-01-26T12:29:59","date_gmt":"2013-01-26T17:29:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ssgreenberg.name\/PoliticsBlog\/?p=13306"},"modified":"2013-01-26T13:19:11","modified_gmt":"2013-01-26T18:19:11","slug":"nicholas-eberstadt-yes-mr-president-we-are-a-nation-of-takers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ssgreenberg.name\/PoliticsBlog\/2013\/01\/26\/nicholas-eberstadt-yes-mr-president-we-are-a-nation-of-takers\/","title":{"rendered":"Nicholas Eberstadt: Yes, Mr. President, We Are a Nation of Takers"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Reader WayneP sent me a link to the item <a title=\"The Wall Street Journal opinion piece\" href=\"http:\/\/online.wsj.com\/article\/SB10001424127887323539804578259940213918254.html\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>Nicholas Eberstadt: Yes, Mr. President, We Are a Nation of Takers<\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>A growing body of empirical evidence points to increasing dependency on state largess. The evidence documents as well a number of perverse and disturbing changes that this entitlement state is imposing on society.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>I decided to do a little research on this item.\u00a0 So far I have found <a title=\"Article from Truth Out\" href=\"http:\/\/truth-out.org\/news\/item\/12929-the-big-lie-about-the-entitlement-state\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>The Big Lie About the &#8220;Entitlement State&#8221;<\/strong><\/a> .<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Is the view that \u201centitlements\u201d\u2014government programs like Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid\u2014\u201cwill bankrupt the country\u201d a \u201csensible conclusion\u201d? No. It\u2019s scare-mongering of the \u201cOH MYGOD WE\u2019RE ALL GOING TO DIE!\u201d variety, completely unjustified by a sober look at data on government transfer payments between 1960 and 2010.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>This second article is not a direct refutation of everything in the first article, far from it.\u00a0 However it does delve a little deeper into the interpretation of raw numbers that might seem very scary if you leave out certain relevant context.<\/p>\n<p>Obviously more research needs to be done to figure out which story is closer to reality, if in fact either story is anywhere near reality.<\/p>\n<p>Do you ever wonder with the share of wealth and income migrating to the upper few percent in this country over the last 30 or more years, who are the real takers?\u00a0 Well, at least who are the more successful takers?<\/p>\n<div style=\"text-align:center\">\n  <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/blogs\/wonkblog\/wp\/2012\/09\/18\/who-receives-benefits-from-the-federal-government-in-six-charts\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/blogs\/ezra-klein\/files\/2012\/09\/2-10-12bud-f3.jpg\" \/><\/a>\n<\/div>\n<p>How about the above for some undefined data taken out of context?  Make of this what you will.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Reader WayneP sent me a link to the item Nicholas Eberstadt: Yes, Mr. President, We Are a Nation of Takers. A growing body of empirical evidence points to increasing dependency on state largess. The evidence documents as well a number of perverse and disturbing changes that this entitlement state is imposing on society. I decided [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[166],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-13306","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-stevegsposts","7":"czr-hentry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ssgreenberg.name\/PoliticsBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13306","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ssgreenberg.name\/PoliticsBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ssgreenberg.name\/PoliticsBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ssgreenberg.name\/PoliticsBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ssgreenberg.name\/PoliticsBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13306"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/ssgreenberg.name\/PoliticsBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13306\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13308,"href":"https:\/\/ssgreenberg.name\/PoliticsBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13306\/revisions\/13308"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ssgreenberg.name\/PoliticsBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13306"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ssgreenberg.name\/PoliticsBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13306"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ssgreenberg.name\/PoliticsBlog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13306"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}