Beware socialists in white coats
Sir Michael Marmot, whom the ABC chose to deliver the 2016 Boyer lectures, is the perfect man for the job. He is a socialist. But more than that, he is a socialist in a white coat, which makes him more dangerous than a garden-variety socialist. He is obsessed with inequality, and has discovered after a lifetime of observation, that the poor are sicker than the rich. Well done Sir Michael, give the man a knighthood.
Marmot you see is a doctor. Indeed, he is Professor of Epidemiology and Public Health at University College London. He is the intellectual godfather of the ‘Social Determinants of Health’ mob and is a mover and shaker at the UN. Marmot stated in a UN report, ‘Health [inequity]… is a matter of social justice and… social injustice is killing people on a grand scale’.
Unfortunately, Marmot and his Australian followers have no idea how to fix the problem other than ‘tackle the inequitable distribution of power, money, and resources’. Even if this is true, it would take a long time to achieve and many patients could die waiting.
Public health was once a field of contagious disease and sanitation. It now deals with ‘junk’ food and ‘bad’ habits. As one analyst put it, ‘despised lifestyles are now identified as noncontagious epidemics’. The basic urge of public health advocates is to remove decisions from individuals over the choices they make in their daily lives.
Soak the rich
Marmot has one string to his bow: soak the rich. He made the suggestion on the ABC’s Q&A (where else?) that the top 25 Wall St bankers, who each earn one billion dollars per year, should, in effect, have their money confiscated. The money would be used for good deeds that Marmot and his fellows deem to be appropriate. Warren Mundine, who was the guest ‘right winger’ that night, called Marmot’s suggestion a ‘fantasy’. And he was right.
Take a moment to analyse this gem, much applauded by the Q&A audience.
Hillary Clinton has vowed, if elected, to institute the so-called Warren Buffett rule, which would impose a minimum tax rate of 30 per cent on anyone making more than $1 million a year. By the way, Hillary and Bill Clinton earned nearly $140 million between 2007 and 2014, and paid an overall federal tax rate of 36 per cent during those years.
At present in the USA, people with income above $250,000 pay 52 per cent of all individual income taxes, though they made up only 3 per cent of taxpayers. Their average tax rate was 26 per cent. People with incomes of less than $50,000 accounted for 62 per cent of taxpayers, but they paid six per cent of total taxes. Their average tax rate was 4 per cent. Like Australia, the rich in the USA already pay most of the bills.
The humble worker pays a few thousand dollars in tax, more if they smoke, drink or gamble. The billionaire funds manager pays tens of millions of dollars to government for services they either never use, or have to pay for.
If Marmot’s dreams were realised and he could further soak the rich he would have to make the following calculation. How much harm or social loss would occur because the funds manager’s funds, almost all of which, of course, is sitting in some money-earning fund, were taken?
How many businesses would find it more difficult to borrow to create employment and pay taxes as a result of the loss of these funds to Marmotian dreams?
By the time the NGO takes its cut and the high failure rate of almost all interventions is accounted for, there would be little to crow about.
Like success, poverty has many fathers
Marmot runs the same ruler over all circumstances. And yet, poverty, like success, has many fathers. Third world nations have large proportions of poor because they are badly run. First world nations have few poor, and the poor are much more likely architects of their own demise. Second world nations, to use an old term, have an intermediate number of poor whose fates are sealed by a mixture of poor political systems, closed economies, and poor behaviour. Indigenous inhabitants of any nation, who may be subject to prejudice and bad administration, also often fail to adapt to their new circumstances.
Third world poverty alleviation requires a liberal revolution, as occurred in most Western states generations ago. First world poverty alleviation requires a welfare state, coupled with stringent obligations. Every advanced nation has built a welfare state, although only recently commenced strong obligations. As for indigenous poverty alleviation, it requires integration.
Australia has devoted literally billions of dollars per year to mere tens of thousands of Aborigines in the last 40 years. The amounts are more than any socialist has ever dreamed, and still it does not work. Marmot needs to appreciate that people cannot be treated like laboratory rats. Lives are damaged when propped up by government programs, locked into collective land ownership and subject to sick culture.
The broad observation, poverty begets poor health, is nothing more than a truism. The truism suggests the wrong answers. For example, infant mortality has been substantially solved in advanced nations, including among indigenous peoples, because it is possible to attend to babies and their diseases and coach mothers in simple care tasks. In essence, you can protect babies because you can control their lives. It is far more difficult to run the life of an adult. Once they are free to make choices, they are liable to rack up many hard knocks.
