The latest from our friend and colleague Frank Salinger in DC. Follow Frank on Twitter @annapolislawyer
November 2011
THOUGHTS ON BUSINESS AND GOVERNMENT
Behind the Budget
The New(er) Math
I’m no math wizard. I was not terrible at arithmetic—when I remembered to carry my numbers—but the wheels came off when Maryland public schools adopted what was then called the “New Math.” This short-lived experiment in educational faddism included using a base of 8 numbers rather than 10 and, as far as I recall, you could end up with different answers to the same problem. Worse yet, some numbers really meant other numbers. I never could figure our why a “7” was no longer a “7” and pretended to be a “9”. Didn’t we already have a “9”? Satirist Tom Lehrer even wrote a song called New Math that went “It’s so simple, So very simple, That only a child can do it” before concluding that “13-5=7.” Famously, even the Soviet Union rejected this scheme and taught traditional math. No wonder they were able to fire Sputnik into space. It’s the reason I’ve always been sanguine about school prayer. I prayed to every religion, monotheistic or not, before every math quiz, test or exam until I escaped 10th grade with a merciful (and passing) D in math.
Compared to federal budgeting though, New Math was almost rational. We all know that the GOP cut spending by $38 billion in 2011. We read that in all the press releases so it must be true. We’ve read Paul Krugman and other liberal economists claim all this austerity brought on by government spending cuts has been a drag on the economy. Vice President Biden’s staff chimed in to claim government spending cutbacks led to sharp losses in state and local employment.
Using real (i.e., Old Math), one can quickly see that both the Right and the Left are completely wrong. During the first nine months of this year, federal spending rose $120 billion higher than in the same period in 2010. That’s a 5% increase (for these purposes a “5” is really a “5”). Even worse, the deficit climbed another $23.5 billion.
The states haven’t curbed their profligacy either. Total state outlays in 2010 were almost 10% higher than in 2008, according to the National Association of State Budget Officers’ annual State Expenditure Report which also concludes that general fund spending — which makes up about 40% of total state spending — is expected to climb 5.2% in 2011 and 2.6% in 2012. Far from laying off teachers and public safety workers—the President’s standard camping trope—the number of state and local government jobs has fallen just 2.3% since 2007—far less than the beleaguered private sector.
The point I’m making isn’t to call for more spending cuts—although I think that is sound and necessary public policy—but to suggest that the half-truths from both sides of poach spectrum are one reason the American people find politics so distasteful and, to some extent, why a quintessentially establishment figure like Mitt Romney can’t close the deal with GOP voters. Not that any of this is his fault, but who can trust establishment figures of either stripe?
The anti-establishment (or perhaps new establishment) trends and tools are changing all manner of things including government relations and lobbying. In an era when a political ad showing Herman Cain’s campaign manager smoking a cigarette can go viral and everyone under 30 (including Capitol Hill staffers) are well versed in social media, I’m struck by the reluctance of many companies to engage.
It’s odd that the nonprofit world is so much more adept at social media. For example, the Chronicle of Philanthropy found 92% of charities linked their web site to a Facebook page and 90% link to Twitter feeds. The number in the for-profit world is nowhere near that. I expect some of this is due to corporate legal departments’ fear of saying anything. After all, it’s hard to attach a disclaimer to a 140 character tweet. Nevertheless, social media is an effective and inexpensive tool to reach lawmakers and to get your company’s message points into the public policy arena.
Let’s get started.
Frank M. Salinger