Many noted yesterday's George Will column in which he came out foursquare against a federal minimum wage. Not just an increase, but against the very idea of a minimum wage. He called labor a "comodity"; I don't understand how human action can become something that is traded in the open market, like hog futures. This very idea was attacked in the mid- and late-19th century as "wage slavery" (see Christopher Lasch's The True and Only Heaven) precisely because it dehumanized workers, making them little different from wheat going to the mill.
That aside, the reason Will gave was the inability of government action to give us the results intended. The so-called "law of unintended consequences", which only stated that any solution to a problem very often creates a whole new set of problems all its own, has become the law of opposite consequences - when we set out to do something, the exact opposite of our intentions occurs. Will takes this to be axiomatic, and it is both familiar, repeated ad nauseum by right-wing and libertarian types (remember the whole "faceless bureaucrat" business back in the 1990's?), and has even emerged as a way of attempting to discuss the miserable failure of Katrina relief in New Orleans. I believe Will accepts it as true, but that only proves what an ignoramus he is. I believe libertarians accept it as true, which is why I find libertarians to be an intellectually and morally hollow people. The truth is government action - which includes everything from localities building roads and schools to states building bridges to the federal government delivering our mail, fighting wars, and collecting taxes - achieves the goals set forth, usually, as long as the agencies involved follow their own internal processes correctly, which is a business way of saying that they follow the law. Even more important to note, there have been many, many government programs that have been rousing successes - I would just note two World Wars the United States engaged in as a start. Part of the list of government programs that have been rousing successes have been: the Tennessee Valley Authority (part of the larger Depression-era Rural Electrification Program that brough light and heat to millions); the WPA, which built schools and post offices, bridges and community centers, and rebuilt the US highway system; the Civilian Conservation Corps, which landscaped recreation areas in national parks, created access roads with surprsingly little environmental damage, plantged thousands and hudreds of thousands of trees; Head Start; the GI Bill of Rights which, in the words of the late William Manchester, gave us the best-educated generation of Americans in its history; NASA; food stamps; Social Security.
This is a partial list, and I would just add, as a note, that even Prohibition was a success, as the incidence of alcoholism, alcohol-related disease and accident, and general alcohol consumption declined dramatically during the 1920's. Only among the privileged did boot-leg liquor flourish (the speakeasies cost a lot of money to operate - there were judges to pay off, cops to pay off, mob security to arrange, etc.). The larger point is that those on the right, including George Will, who routinely disparage government action simply do not know what they are talking about. The fact that our current administration lacks the ability to even follow its own laws and procedures (which, had they done son, would have saved New Orleans) is not an argument against government action. It is an argument against government malfeasance an incompetence. When things are done right, they are usually done well, as well.
At a deeper level, it is important to realize that the libertarian argument misses two things that are important to remember. First, historically speaking, government has been the chief cause and contributor to innovation and capital imporovement - from maintaining roads and the police and security forces necessary to connect disparate parts of a realm together to investment in industry and agriculture (who else would buy all the wool to make uniforms, wheat and meat to feed armies, iron and wood as well as the craftsmen to make weapons?). To pretend otherwise is to engage in obfuscation at best, or ouright lying at worst. Second, the libertarian argument assumes that human individual action is inherently better than corporate action. this is an assumption, with no rational basis. The counter-argument, that societies together demand action by their leaders and representatives for corporate defense and benefit, is not only not an assertion, it has been demonstrated time and again historically - this is the way social groups function, including whole societies and states. The United States is no different in this regard; we have a social contract that demands concerted corporate action to help those who need help, to rescue those who are the victims of chance and happenstance, and to give aid and comfort to those without any other recourse. Ours is a much looser, much less satisfying social safety net than, say, those in western Europe, but it exists for a reason, and needs to be strengthened, not dismantled. Indeed, I think part of the rejection of the current brand of Republican politics is the realization that there were and are tearing threads in the social fabric, and that this damage threatens us as a whole people.
Government action on the minimum wage guarantees that there is a level below which, it is unacceptable to pay people for the work they provide. Of course, there are hundreds of thousans, even millions, who earn below the minimum wage, but this shows another utliity it has - it is a good, rough basis for comparing wages and salaries, and as such serves as a goad to those who refuse to meet even its very low standard. To those silly-minded people who say "Why not $10 an hour, or $100?" I would remind this is not an argument. This line of thinking can be made as absurd in the opposite direction, and ask, "Why not ask employees to pay employers for the privilege of working?" These questions assume the minimum wage is something it is not, social engineering through the manipulation of market forces. The minimum wage is the corporate response to the socio-economic damage wrought by corporations who, without the prodding of the law, would refuse to pay a living wage to their employees. This is not hyperbole or class warfare, it is ismply a summary of historic fact.
While it is true that meandering the maze of the minutiae of government regulation and process can be intimidating, even infuriating, this does not mean that government action, in and of itself, is bad, or wrong, or even philosophically unjustifiable. Rather, it shows that government action, like all human action, is limited by human fallibility and imperfection. Since we shall never be perfect or infallible, why not accept the limited nature of government action - its failures and successes - and move on?
