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Currents
September 2018
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are asked broad questions about how big government
should be, or if they approve of larger taxes, they reflex-
ively sound pretty conservative. But when they’re asked
more concrete questions about funding for Social Security
or unemployment insurance, they sound pretty liberal.
When you really drill down, you find that people like these
benefits, but when the game of politics is played in a way
that draws people’s attention to abstractions, conserva-
tives win. And when liberals can manage to draw attention
to specifics, they win.
Suzanne Mettler: I think informa-
tion can help, but I think we shouldn’t
exaggerate how much it helps. New
information only helps those who are
actually open to it, and the truth is
that many people aren’t. We’re in this
very partisan environment where it
matters to people who is conveying a
message, and there isn’t a lot of
trust. I’ve come to the conclusion
that relationships are more important.
And I think organizations need to be
making these things much more
clear to people in their everyday
lives. I also think that, as a citizenry,
we need to rethink how we talk about
our lives and the role that govern-
ment has had in it.
Suzanne Mettler: I agree that this
government-citizen
disconnect
makes it really difficult for govern-
ment to do anything constructive
about economic inequality, but it’s
not just that. It actually undermines
government’s capacity to do much of
anything. Government is what we
have in common, our shared capac-
ity to do something to overcome what
political scientists call “collective
action problems” — that is, inherent
disincentives to work together for the
common good. These are problems
that cannot be solved by your
church, your family, businesses, or
other organizations. They require
government action. In the United
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