One must admire its stark honesty at least, if not its greedy grab for more of the national pie. This is a reference, of course, to the long-term budget plan put forth yesterday by House Budget Chairman Paul D. Ryan which the House is expected to pass in the next few days and endorse as the GOP’s budget blueprint for the future.
In case you missed it, the GOP proposal would cut $5.8 trillion in spending over the next decade. Most of those cuts would come from Medicare, Medicaid, and from repeal of the health care law. At the same time, it would slash individual and corporate income taxes, reducing the top rate to 25 percent from the current 35 percent.
To be fair, any honest discussion of long-term budget reform must include changes to the health care system, including Medicare and Medicaid. It also must include changes in Social Security and reduced military spending, two issues that Ryan either ignores, as in the case of Social Security, or soft pedaled, in the case of military spending.
But to bludgeon programs that primarily help the poor and disadvantaged in our society while cutting taxes that will benefit mostly the wealthiest among us is stunning in its naked lust for more of the national pie. This at a time when the distribution of wealth and benefits is already overwhelming skewed in favor of the rich and the income disparity gap grows wider.
In WINNER TAKE ALL POLITICS, authors Jacob S. Hacker and Paul Pierson, state that “from 1979 until the eve of the Great Recession [2005] the top one percent [of Americans] received 36 percent of all gains in household income – even after taking into account the value of employer-sponsored health insurance, federal taxes, and all government benefits.”
The top 0.1 percent had it even better, they say, gaining 20 percent of all after-tax income gains. “If the total income growth of these years were a pie,” they write, “the slice enjoyed by the roughly 300,000 people in the top tenth of 1 percent would be half again as large as the slice enjoyed by the roughly 180 million in the bottom 60 percent.” Meantime, the income growth of the people in between was modest, with their spending power remaining essentially stagnant.
This neatly sums up for me once again the reason I am still a liberal Democrat, with all its warts, its ugly racial past, its excesses, and its maddeningly self-destructive ways. At its core, the Democratic Party has maintained a steady preferential option for the poor, a phrase enshrined in Catholic social teaching since the dawn of the 20th century and the heart of liberal Democratic policies and administrations since the Roosevelt Administration.
Despite everything, that is one single factor that has kept me in the Democratic fold since I first voted in 1960. And, once again, as the 2012 election draws near, the choice for me could not be more clear — or more easy.
Gerald E. Lavey
Wednesday, April 6, 2011
Monday, March 28, 2011
A Rock and a Hard Place
Like so many Americans, I am anxious to hear how President Obama is going to discuss our role in Libya in his address to the nation tonight. I applaud the step he took to prevent a slaughter of innocent people there. But, it’s not clear in my mind why Libya and not Syria, for example, or other countries in the region whose leaders will not hesitate to kill their own citizens to hold on to power.
What happens if the unrest in the Middle East spreads and citizens of Saudi Arabia rise up against their rulers? Do we intervene? And, if not, how do we decide? What is our policy? Is it based on strategic national interests, such as access to oil or the critical location of U.S. military bases in those countries? I think the President has to start addressing the situation from a broader perspective.
His task is made doubly difficult by the fact that we Americans are conflicted in own minds on how we should regard our role in the world. Are we the “go anywhere, pay any price” country described by President Kennedy or a more pragmatic country willing to venture forth only when we can afford it and it’s strictly in our national interest?
However stirring the call of JFK in 1961, we saw where that and President George W. Bush’s crusade for democracy in Iraq four decades later got us. Yet, our hearts are still tugged in that direction because this country has always stood as a beacon of freedom around the world and has gone to war time and time again to rid the world of dictators who would have stripped people of those freedoms.
And, because of that, we got ourselves in an untenable situation. In the aftermath of the Cold War where America emerged as the world’s only superpower, we stepped up and assumed that role. Meanwhile, other countries were more than willing to defer to America as “the world’s cop” who would come to their rescue if their liberty and freedoms were threatened and we built a military machine that enabled us to carry out that role. To the point that today America’s spending on military is greater than the next 14 countries combined.
Can we afford to continue that role while ignoring our nation’s vital future strength by reducing spending on education and research and ignoring decades-old repairs and replacements of our nation’s critical infrastructure, to cite just a few obvious examples? The current course is unsustainable, to use the favorite word in today’s political lexicon. That’s why I was heartened to see the President say to our partners in the U.N. that America was not going to take the lead in establishing a no-fly zone over Libya. While some saw it as dithering and indecisive, I saw it as pragmatic and far-sighted.
The President is caught between a rock and a hard place, but this is an opportunity for him to clarify our role in the world in the light of our obvious fiscal limitations and other competing national and international priorities. The partisan politics of this are daunting but I dearly hope he steps up and is willing to spend the political capital to sell such a policy and take the majority of Americans along with him.
Stay tuned.
Gerald E. Lavey
What happens if the unrest in the Middle East spreads and citizens of Saudi Arabia rise up against their rulers? Do we intervene? And, if not, how do we decide? What is our policy? Is it based on strategic national interests, such as access to oil or the critical location of U.S. military bases in those countries? I think the President has to start addressing the situation from a broader perspective.
His task is made doubly difficult by the fact that we Americans are conflicted in own minds on how we should regard our role in the world. Are we the “go anywhere, pay any price” country described by President Kennedy or a more pragmatic country willing to venture forth only when we can afford it and it’s strictly in our national interest?
However stirring the call of JFK in 1961, we saw where that and President George W. Bush’s crusade for democracy in Iraq four decades later got us. Yet, our hearts are still tugged in that direction because this country has always stood as a beacon of freedom around the world and has gone to war time and time again to rid the world of dictators who would have stripped people of those freedoms.
And, because of that, we got ourselves in an untenable situation. In the aftermath of the Cold War where America emerged as the world’s only superpower, we stepped up and assumed that role. Meanwhile, other countries were more than willing to defer to America as “the world’s cop” who would come to their rescue if their liberty and freedoms were threatened and we built a military machine that enabled us to carry out that role. To the point that today America’s spending on military is greater than the next 14 countries combined.
Can we afford to continue that role while ignoring our nation’s vital future strength by reducing spending on education and research and ignoring decades-old repairs and replacements of our nation’s critical infrastructure, to cite just a few obvious examples? The current course is unsustainable, to use the favorite word in today’s political lexicon. That’s why I was heartened to see the President say to our partners in the U.N. that America was not going to take the lead in establishing a no-fly zone over Libya. While some saw it as dithering and indecisive, I saw it as pragmatic and far-sighted.
The President is caught between a rock and a hard place, but this is an opportunity for him to clarify our role in the world in the light of our obvious fiscal limitations and other competing national and international priorities. The partisan politics of this are daunting but I dearly hope he steps up and is willing to spend the political capital to sell such a policy and take the majority of Americans along with him.
Stay tuned.
Gerald E. Lavey
Thursday, March 17, 2011
Building a Better Boss
The headline, “The Quest to Build a Better Boss,” jumped off the front page of the Business section as I was flipping through the Sunday New York Times this past weekend. Even though retired and no longer having to deal with such issues, the leadership/manager/boss concept still piques my interest.
The Times’ article has to do with a project that Google launched in 2009 called Project Oxygen. As reporter Adam Bryant writes,” Its mission was to devise something far more important to the future of Google, Inc. than its next search algorithm or app.” It deals with “building better bosses.”
Later in 2009, Bryant reports, the project team came up with “Eight Habits of Highly Effective Google Managers.” A lot of déjà vu there, I know, but don’t hit the delete button yet. What I liked about Google’s approach, as reported by the Times, is that it is very simple and clear. Dead last in the hierarchy is “technical expertise.”
Heading the list, on the other hand, is “be a good coach,” followed by “empower your team and don’t micromanage,” “express interest in team members’ success and personal well-being,” “be a good communicator and listen to your team,” and so on. Technical expertise is important, but here is the context in which the Google team puts that role: “Roll up your sleeves and conduct work side by side with team, when needed (italics mine).” And, “understand the specific challenges of the work.”
Once, at an offsite for FAA executives, one of the speakers on the program was a Marine officer who was there to talk about leadership. He started off by saying he had distilled the essence of leadership down to one word, then paused while everyone was quietly wondering what he would say. He looked around the room and finally said, “Leadership is about love.” You could have heard the proverbial pin drop. This was not a long-haired guy wearing sandals and beads. He was a strong, experienced Marine who had been in combat and had led others into combat. When, he started talking on what love looks like in that context, many of the examples he cited were right in line with Google’s conclusions.
To use that old tired, trite, hackneyed line that grates on the nerves but occasionally serves a useful purpose: “It ain’t rocket science,” is it? Then, why is it that one doesn’t find more bosses like that? They’re clearly the exception. One very simple reason is that over time in many organizations, top people in the organization pick the managers reporting to them and they in turn pick those next in line, and this incestuous process goes on right down the line. A prime example is my own Catholic Church. John Paul II and the current Pope, Benedict XVI, have selected all the Cardinals in the College of Cardinals who will pick the successor to Benedict XVI. Think they’ll pick a reformist Pope like John XXIII? Hardly.
But, the Vatican is not unique. It happens to organizations, public and private, all over the world. And, sadly, many of these same organizations have a professed desire to change, but they keep doing the same thing over and over and expect a different result. And that, as we all know, is the definition of insanity.
With the “grin and bear it” generation retiring and dying out, the new generation of workers has a far different outlook on the workplace and bosses. And, once the economy recovers, and workforce fluidity returns, they won’t simply stick around with organizations that don’t treat them right. Despite all its technical expertise and orientation, Google seems to understand that.
So, if organizations want “to win the future,” which the United States is trying to do writ large, they need to do what Google is trying to do. They don’t need to do more studies and establish commissions, etc. They need to break the mold and start hiring leaders with more and better soft skills in their managerial tool box. In other words, managers who understand in their heart and at a gut level The Golden Rule – that employees want to be treated the same way we all want to be treated.
It ain’t rocket science, is it?
Gerald E. Lavey
The Times’ article has to do with a project that Google launched in 2009 called Project Oxygen. As reporter Adam Bryant writes,” Its mission was to devise something far more important to the future of Google, Inc. than its next search algorithm or app.” It deals with “building better bosses.”
Later in 2009, Bryant reports, the project team came up with “Eight Habits of Highly Effective Google Managers.” A lot of déjà vu there, I know, but don’t hit the delete button yet. What I liked about Google’s approach, as reported by the Times, is that it is very simple and clear. Dead last in the hierarchy is “technical expertise.”
Heading the list, on the other hand, is “be a good coach,” followed by “empower your team and don’t micromanage,” “express interest in team members’ success and personal well-being,” “be a good communicator and listen to your team,” and so on. Technical expertise is important, but here is the context in which the Google team puts that role: “Roll up your sleeves and conduct work side by side with team, when needed (italics mine).” And, “understand the specific challenges of the work.”
Once, at an offsite for FAA executives, one of the speakers on the program was a Marine officer who was there to talk about leadership. He started off by saying he had distilled the essence of leadership down to one word, then paused while everyone was quietly wondering what he would say. He looked around the room and finally said, “Leadership is about love.” You could have heard the proverbial pin drop. This was not a long-haired guy wearing sandals and beads. He was a strong, experienced Marine who had been in combat and had led others into combat. When, he started talking on what love looks like in that context, many of the examples he cited were right in line with Google’s conclusions.
To use that old tired, trite, hackneyed line that grates on the nerves but occasionally serves a useful purpose: “It ain’t rocket science,” is it? Then, why is it that one doesn’t find more bosses like that? They’re clearly the exception. One very simple reason is that over time in many organizations, top people in the organization pick the managers reporting to them and they in turn pick those next in line, and this incestuous process goes on right down the line. A prime example is my own Catholic Church. John Paul II and the current Pope, Benedict XVI, have selected all the Cardinals in the College of Cardinals who will pick the successor to Benedict XVI. Think they’ll pick a reformist Pope like John XXIII? Hardly.
But, the Vatican is not unique. It happens to organizations, public and private, all over the world. And, sadly, many of these same organizations have a professed desire to change, but they keep doing the same thing over and over and expect a different result. And that, as we all know, is the definition of insanity.
With the “grin and bear it” generation retiring and dying out, the new generation of workers has a far different outlook on the workplace and bosses. And, once the economy recovers, and workforce fluidity returns, they won’t simply stick around with organizations that don’t treat them right. Despite all its technical expertise and orientation, Google seems to understand that.
So, if organizations want “to win the future,” which the United States is trying to do writ large, they need to do what Google is trying to do. They don’t need to do more studies and establish commissions, etc. They need to break the mold and start hiring leaders with more and better soft skills in their managerial tool box. In other words, managers who understand in their heart and at a gut level The Golden Rule – that employees want to be treated the same way we all want to be treated.
It ain’t rocket science, is it?
Gerald E. Lavey
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