I’d like to discuss Social Security in a roundabout way. I do a lot of work that deals with web hosting companies. Most of them offer some kind of money-back guarantee. And the better ones will add something like, “No questions asked!” It got me thinking of a small minded business owner who offers a money-back guarantee and then grouses every time someone takes them up on it. What’s with that?

You have to think about why a company offers a money-back guarantee. It’s done to signal trust to the customer. It’s a form of marketing. The company doesn’t offer it just because it is nice; it offers it because it believes that it will only get some of the more marginal customers by offering it. And the truth is, people rarely do take advantage of money-back guarantees. Much more common is someone who buys hosting and then never uses it — effectively giving the hosting company money for nothing at all.

Our small minded business owner is not looking at the situation logically. They are seeing just what they lose and nothing of what they gain. It is like advertising in the newspaper and then complaining that it is costing you money. Right! Because you are getting something for the money. You have to look at both sides of the ledger. And it is the same thing in politics.

I constantly hear conservatives talking about phasing out Social Security. Their favorite trick is to say that it won’t affect anyone 55 and older (which just happens to be the core of their political support). But the way that Social Security operates is that people working now pay for the people retired now. That was the only way the program could work, given that it had to start at some point.

So let’s suppose we tell 25 year olds that they will not get Social Security when they retire. Well, the older people still need their benefits, which means that we will still have to be collecting payroll taxes. But by the thinking of conservatives who have wanted to destroy the program from its very first day, this poses no problem: it depends upon young people being fine with 15% of their income taken that will never — and could never — benefit them. Is that a reasonable assumption? Of course not!

The truth is that conservatives know this. They might make up pretty stories for people close to retirement, but they know that younger people would never agree to pay the same highly regressive tax if their benefits were reduced — for the youngest, to zero. But despite what they say, the idea is not that Social Security is going bankrupt (because it isn’t). And it isn’t about reforming the program going forward. It is about killing the program — as quickly as possible for everyone.

It’s not that they just hate people. It’s that conservatives are the most ideological people in the nation. They care more about that ideology than they do people, because in their minds, if only their ideology were followed, all the problems would disappear. So I’m not saying they are psychopaths. But I am saying that they want to destroy Social Security (and a whole lot more). You should never believe them when they talk about “reform.” When conservatives talk about “reform” they are really trying to pick your pocket.

Kevin Drum made a huge mistake in an article last week, “Free Trade” Is an Election-Year Nothingburger. I’ll get to his more general point in a bit, but he really blew it. And he even knows it. He wrote, “It’s always dangerous arguing with [Dean] Baker…” Yes! Yes it is! And when you find yourself writing things like “This is probably a bad idea, but…” you probably shouldn’t write it!

What he did was totally straw man Baker’s argument that globalization has been a one-way street. Baker has long argued (because it has long been true) that it has been free trade for manufacturing workers and others who don’t make a whole lot of money. And it has be big time protectionism for highly paid people like doctors and lawyers. This is, of course, not the only problem with globalization, but it is a really important one.

Kevin Drum calls foul, saying it “really doesn’t hold water.” So how is that? Well you see, when manufacturing jobs go overseas, the stuff they make still has to “meet American standards.” But that wouldn’t be true of the doctors who were coming to the United States! Because as we all know, French and Japanese doctors (who make half what American doctors make) are no good at their jobs! That’s why people die so young in those countries. Oh, wait…

But here’s what really makes me mad about Kevin Drum’s argument: Dean Baker has addressed this issue virtually every time he’s talked about free trade as it applies to highly paid professionals. He’s always going on about foreign doctors training to American standards. In fact, I’ve been somewhat annoyed about it. I’ve thought, “Enough! I get it!” But apparently, he didn’t say it enough because Kevin Drum, who is really smart and who I greatly admire, did not get it.

What bothers me in a more general way, however, is that Kevin Drum’s article is mostly a defense of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). Well, maybe not a defense. It’s more, “Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain!” Most people don’t see trade deals as having hurt them, so who cares?! Well, that’s the way it is with large scale processes. Certainly Kevin Drum would never make the argument that global warming isn’t happening because some town in Mississippi has actually seen a slight decrease in temperature over the last two decades. He wouldn’t see that as a reason to do nothing about global warming. But when it comes to trade, he’s willing to make that argument.

There are, of course, many people who know that all our “free” trade agreements have affected them directly. Erik Loomis highlighted one in a recent article, Capital Mobility and Trumpism. A Carrier factory is being moved to Mexico. And an executive kindly told the laid-off men and women, “Workers there [in Mexico] typically earn about $19 a day — less than what many on the assembly line here make in an hour.” As Loomis noted, “The doctrine of unrestricted free trade has been basically bipartisan for many decades now. But no one ever thought hard enough about what this would look like when all the manufacturing jobs were gone.” That’s because those in power didn’t and don’t care, at least for as long as there isn’t a fascist takeover of the country.

What’s particularly bad is that Kervin Drum is not alone in his apologetics. I’ve been seeing a lot of liberal cheer leading recently for the TPP. Did a secret memo go out? It’s especially interesting when Paul Krugman, who has always been very pro-free trade, is now backing away from new trade deals. So it is a very good thing that people like Dean Baker keep hammering away at them. Kevin Drum should know better than to create a straw man out of Baker’s arguments. Just what does Drum think he’s doing?

Afterword: Dean Baker Responds to Kevin Drum

Dean Baker responded to Kevin Drum’s article, Kevin Drum Strikes Out Big Time on Trade. I don’t think he made his strongest case, probably because he likes Drum.

Afterword: the Battle Continues

Kevin Drum was right to be worried about a fight. After Baker’s article, Drum wrote, Dean Baker Needs Better Trade Comparisons. It’s a face-saving article. Basically, Drum is conceding the point but trying to argue about the specific case with doctors. But this is why, “It’s always dangerous arguing with Baker…” Dean Baker is having none of it, More on Kevin Drum’s Protectionism for Doctors. Unfortunately, this is not a “pass the popcorn” moment, because Baker and Drum are more or less in agreement. Still, it is pretty funny because of Drum original comment. It is always dangerous arguing with Dean Baker no matter who you are.