One might be inclined to take the November election results as a sign that Americans are growing more comfortable with the idea of transforming this nation into a replica of a standard European social democratic welfare state. William Voegeli suggests in the latest National Review that the evidence doesn’t match that theory.
In 2010, Sweden’s government revenues were 99 percent of government spending. Denmark’s equaled 95 percent, and France’s were 87 percent, meaning that those countries’ big spenders were also big taxers. Politicians win power there by persuading citizens that, while generous government benefits will indeed require high taxes, they’ll be better off with that combination than with the alternative: keeping more of their earnings in exchange for the government’s curtailing benefits.
In America, by contrast, government revenues equaled 75 percent of outlays in 2010, meaning that federal, state, and local governments borrowed one dollar for every three they summoned the language and courage to raise by taxation. Northern Europe, in other words, finances big welfare states with heavy taxes and little borrowing, while the U.S. finances a smaller one with lighter taxes and extensive borrowing. That difference supports the narrower contention that Swedenization is un-American but not necessarily untenable in any polity. Our deeply rooted, don’t tread-on-me Jeffersonianism means that we cannot be persuaded to buy even a relatively modest welfare state unless a significant portion of the purchase is financed with debt. In this we are unlike the Europeans, who want cradle-to-grave welfare states enough to pay cash for them.
If you doubt Voegeli’s thesis, try searching for any instance during the last presidential campaign in which President Obama suggested that middle- and working-class Americans would have to pay more — much more — to cover the costs of the American government’s $3.5 trillion in spending.
