Chait on the GOP's desperate push to kill Obamacare

Here's a fascinating must-read on the implementation of Obamacare regarding the differences of rhetoric between the pro- and anti- Affordable Care Act factions. It's a wonderfully researched summary full of very interesting political science hypotheses waiting to be tested.

Jonathan Chait was one of the earliest, best and most thorough reporters on the ACA as it wheezed toward passage. It's only fitting that he's here writing excellent stuff at the end of the journey.

Update: Krugman nails it:

Yep, when it comes to reaching hipsters, or young people in general — I know, Katy Perry — Dems have big advantages; all that coastal cultural elite hatred suddenly turns into a big disadvantage for the right.

But that’s not all: there are also channels of influence the party of Fox News simply cannot reach: Spanish-language radio and TV, black churches (which played a big role in 2012), and more.

I don’t know whether anyone thought this out in advance, but the battle of the exchanges is indeed being fought on remarkably favorable ground for the reformers. And I, for one, find the thought of conservatives humiliated by an army of tweeting hipsters remarkably cheering.

Generation Y and "Entitlement"

Amen Mr. Weinstein.

I have a PhD from one of the finest universities in the country and I've taught more classes than many tenure-track professors have, but after applying for 85 academic jobs in two years, I've come up empty. It's a simply terrifying experience for most of us on the market --we're generally far better qualified than our peers who graduated in the 1960s and 1970s were, but we're being shut out. I'll be writing more on the problems of contingent short-term labor in academia over the coming months, but they're pretty similar to the ones journalists and others of our generation face.

And Weinstein nails my attitude toward people who look at us in the 22-35 crowd with contempt:

This state of affairs does not exist because we're entitled and have simply declined to work as hard as the people that birthed us. American workers have changed from generation to generation: Since 1979, the alleged Dawn of the Millennial, the average U.S. worker has endured a 75 percent increase in productivity...while real wages stayed flat.

Any lecturer with a PhD. patching together a 4-4 course load across three different universities for $19,000 a year gets it.

As I've written, I'm one of the lucky ones -- no student debt, decent health, a soon-to-be spouse with a decent job.  I always wonder if I have the right to complain -- well, here's Weinstein's answer to that question:

So no, we shan't be doing as well as our parents, and no, we shan't be shutting up about it. If anything, those of us who have been cowed into silence because college-educated poor problems aren't real poor problems should shed our fears and start talking about just how hard it really is out there, man.

 So, complain it shall be, though with the awareness that some one is always worse off -- and an emphasis on effective action as well.

As usual, invoking Atrios' sentiment in the titles of his posts sums up the point pithily.

The hidden costs of being unemployed

One of the disadvantages of being poor is that everything costs more. Because you can't put up a month's security deposit on an apartment, you're forced to pay out the nose for a a low-end motel that actually costs a lot more per month than a decent one-bedroom apartment (This book documents this unfortunate reality first hand).  Since the poor live paycheck to paycheck, they can't maintain minimum balances in their checking account and can't take advantage of the traditional banking system. Instead they're forced to "bank" with payday lenders who charge exorbitant interest rates for short-term loans, and even face large fees for the simple act of cashing their paycheck.

As discussed previously, I am by no means poor -- thanks in part to a previous career, supportive upper-middle class parents who helped me get through college, and a soon-to-be spouse who's taking care of pesky things like rent. However, I've made the lovely discovery that being unemployed offers some of the same hidden costs as poverty. Take for example my recent attendance at an academic conference.

In political science, as well as many other disciplines, attending national conferences is an integral part of being a successful academic. You can get your work noticed, get feedback on your scholarship, start to build up your CV and network with other academics. And most importantly for some one without a job, you can get job interviews, which can be your opportunity to stand out from the 50 to 150 other highly qualified applicants who want the same jobs you do.

But you have to get to the conference first. And attending the annual meeting of the American Political Science Association costs a considerable amount of money. First, you have to be an APSA member, which costs an annual fee. Then you have to register for the conference, which costs more. I needed to find a flight from Houston to Chicago and stay in the city for four nights to accomodate several interviews and a scholarly presentation. If you shop around, you can find quite reasonable hotel and flight rates, but I still paid roughly $600 for travel and hotel expenses to spend four days at the conference. Then you still need money for food and travel. You can minimize these costs by taking public transit (a $5 train ride from the airport and $2 bus ride to to hotel beats a $50 cab fare any day), but over four days it still adds up.

Here's the thing: most professors get many of these expenses reimbursed by their employers. As a part of their compensation package, they usually get an annual research grant that can be used for memberships in scholarly organizations and attendance at conferences. In political science, this often ranges from several hundred dollars at small liberal arts colleges to several thousand dollars at large research schools. Graduate students can often (though not always) tap funds to attend conferences as well, either through their professors or through their institutions. At my old school, grad students could attend one conference a year and get up to a $700 grant to cover it -- this little benefit got me about $1500 over three years (and three lines on my CV). Of course, privilege plays a role here too -- richer grad schools generally provide more funding for their grad students to attend conferences, as well as providing better pay and benefits.

Because I'm unemployed however, now I do research on my own dime. Somewhat perversely then, it costs me much more out of pocket to attend a conference than it costs my better-off-financially colleagues who could actually afford it.

I'm not complaining about APSA's management here. The organization tries to mitigate inequality through several mechanisms. First, they have a progressive membership fee structure -- members with higher incomes pay more, and unemployed members pay much less. They also have travel grants to help less well-off members come to the conference -- the $150 they awarded me essentially defrayed the costs of registration and my travel within Chicago.

But like affordable housing units and Head Start slots, there isn't enough aid to go around to all the deserving recipients, let alone fully defray their costs.

Again, please don't take this to mean that I'm putting myself on the same level as a person who needs a payday loan at 50 percent interest to make rent for the month (Remember that context is everything). But it is rather depressing to get a first-hand taste of how the structures that reinforce privilege play out in all sectors of the economy.

Privilege and unemployment (Yes, you CAN have one with the other)

So far this blog has been me reflecting (or perhaps in a moment of weakness, whining) about the difficulties I have faced as a newly minted member of the unemployed army of Americans. One of my goals with this site is to give a bit of insight into some of the challenges that unemployed people face. 

Here's the thing though: I'm unemployed, but I'm shielded from some of the worst aspects of it. I've got a lot of angst, diminished future career prospects, some short-term cash-flow problems, a possible gap in my health insurance (and annoying increased costs in any case) and social isolation.

You see, my Fiance's an MD.  She has a job, which pays quite well. In fact, we're above the median household income for Americans. We can afford good food, rent on a nice apartment in a nice neighborhood in Houston. We drive modest used cars, but we can put gas in them and travel around town without undue worry (repair bills have moved from minor to major annoyances, but they aren't savings account killers for us, or even for me-- yet)

Oh, and neither of us are struggling under a dime of student loans -- that's another trifling matter of $200,000 that's off our backs. Part of that is our own careful financial management; part of it was the luck to be born to loving, stably employed, upwardly mobile, generous parents who believed strongly in funding their children's education. Part of it is a strong public school system funded by taxpayers in Ohio and Michigan. It's wrenching watching my carefully hoarded emergency savings diminish, but I'm not staring at a mountain of debt to pay back.

The fact that we're both white and look a lot like an idealized successful American couple portrayed on TV (minus considerable muscle tone, make-up and eating disorders) doesn't hurt either.




The whole thing is kind of like being Dante traveling through the Inferno: I'm getting a taste of how bad everything is. It's depressing. It's terrifying. It's painful. It's isolating And that depression, terror, pain and isolation are REAL. But I'm just visiting Hell and I'm shielded from the worst of the suffering. Perhaps as I peer out from around Virgil's skirts, I can gain some wisdom and insight in to what the true suffering is; the hope is I can put it to use when I get out of this dreadful pit and can behold the stars again.

But here the metaphor breaks down; most of the unemployed end up so through no fault of their own. They get cast into this particular hell because they happened to graduate during a nasty recession, or happened to have a job in a struggling industry, or became a target for the budget ax in the public sector. No, most of the unemployed are innocent of the malice and sloth they routinely get accused of by some elements of our political system. And most of use feel like failures and want to work. We want to provide, we want to serve society -- it just seems that society doesn't have a place for us.

The final judgement is reserved for those with power who could help the unemployed (and the poor, oppressed, ill etc) ease their suffering, but fail to do so. Sadly, my new home state seems to have quite a few policymakers who fit the bill.

So as you read my musings, please keep in mind that I know paradoxically that I am incredibly lucky in my particular unfortunate situation.