Safety Net Swing Voters

Businessweek is one of the best publications around, and this week is no exception. The magazine has a terrific article on how the GOP's extremist cuts to the social safety net are drawing the ire not just of liberals, but of conservatives as well. As the magazine notes, "Safety Netters include plenty of card-carrying Republicans and independent swing voters, and the group may represent a broader swath of America than the White House imagines."

Sure, "many members of Safety Net Nation have nothing against investing and choice" but "they're worried that the country's web of public and private social protections is fraying." But there is a general consensus that the Bush "ownership society" is a dangerous ploy to screw the middle class.

The polls bear this out: A Sept. 2-5, 2004, survey by the Civil Society Institute, a Newton Centre (Mass.) nonprofit group, found 67% of Americans think it's a good idea to guarantee health care for all U.S. citizens, as Canada and Britain do, with just 27% dissenting. Support for a government-directed universal insurance system is strong, despite GOP warnings about socialized medicine. Similarly, a Feb. 3-5 Washington Post/Kaiser Family Foundation poll found that 47% of respondents believe the government ought to guarantee a minimum standard of living for retirees, vs. 35% who felt that was an individual's responsibility.

Again, the politics of this are quite different than might be expected. Sure, "the most predictable members of Safety Net Nation are liberals who favor activist government." But "the really crucial bloc is made up of those who backed Bush in 2004..This faction -- estimates range from 17% to 22% of the electorate -- rejects both traditional liberalism and conservative laissez-faire."

Why the concern among disparate ideological groups? Big swings in family income, according to studies by Yale University political scientist Jacob S. Hacker, have increased markedly over the past two decades as the finances of two-earner households have been stretched thin. That income volatility mixed with Republicans efforts to "offload ever more responsibility onto individuals" is creating a growing sense of panic that America is turning into an economically Darwinian society - with no safety net whatsoever.

Read the full article here.