The Road to Freedom (23 page)

Beyond AEI, I would like to express gratitude to a number of key individuals who gave me suggestions or material for this book. In particular, I would like to thank Christopher Chandler, Bernie
Marcus, Chuck Schwab, John Mackey, Mark Stoleson, Alan McCormick, Kevin Lewis, Ed Crane, Pete Wehner, and Jon Haidt, as well as my friends at AEI's sister organizations and in the media who provided important feedback on early versions of the manuscript.

I would like to thank my editor Lara Heimert at Basic Books, and my literary agent, Lisa Adams, at the Garamond Agency. Several of the key ideas here were developed in articles published on the editorial pages of the
Wall Street Journal
and the
Washington Post
, for which I am grateful to Paul Gigot, Howard Dickman, Rob Pollock, and Carlos Lozada.

I am humbled by the trust and support of the outstanding members—past and present—of AEI's Board of Trustees and National Council. For support on this project, all of us at AEI would especially like to thank the Anschutz Foundation, the Douglas and Maria DeVos Foundation, the Kern Family Foundation, the Charles Koch Foundation, Legatum, the Marcus Foundation, Jack and Pina Templeton, and the Triad Foundation.

As always, I am particularly indebted to my intellectual partner (and wife), Ester Munt-Brooks, who—as an American by choice instead of by birth—constantly reminded me why our free enterprise system is a moral one at its core. And thanks to our three children Joaquim, Carlos, and Marina, who endured being told many times to leave Dad alone because he is working on his book.

All royalties from this book go to support the work of the American Enterprise Institute.

CHAPTER ONE

1
Lydia Saad, “Americans Express Historic Negativity Toward U.S. Government,”
Gallup.com
, September 26, 2011,
http://www.gallup.com/poll/149678/Americans-Express-Historic-Negativity-Toward-Government.aspx?utm_source=tagrss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=syndication
.

2
Polling data show, for example, that when asked what effect they expect from the health care bill, more Americans say they expect it to increase healthcare costs than say they expect it to decrease costs, and more Americans expect the health-care bill to make health care worse than expect it to make care better. See Jeffery M. Jones, “Many Americans Doubt Costs, Benefits of Healthcare Reform,”
Gallup.com
, September 16, 2009.
www.gallup.com/poll/122969/many-americans-doubt-costs-benefits-heatlthcare-reform.aspx

3
The current debt estimate comes from
http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock/
.

4
Frank Newport, “Despite Negativity, Americans Mixed on Ideal Role of Gov't,”
Gallup.com
, September 28, 2011,
http://www.gallup.com/poll/149741/Despite-Negativity-Americans-Mixed-Ideal-Role-Gov.aspx
.

5
Bret Stephens, “Lessons From Europe (Take 2),”
Wall Street Journal
, August 16, 2011,
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424053111903480904576510200756243420.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEADTop
.

6
Debt statistic from Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (2011), OECD.Stat, (database), doi: 10.1787/data-00285-en.

7
See Michael Novak,
The Spirit of Democratic Capitalism
(Madison Books, 1991); and Charles Murray, “The Happiness of the People,” Irving Kristol Lecture, American Enterprise Institute, 2009.

8
Arthur Brooks,
The Battle: How the Fight Between Free Enterprise and Big Government Will Shape America's Future
(Basic Books, 2010).

9
Joel Roberts, “Poll: The Politics of Healthcare,” CBS
News/New York Times
, June 14, 2010,
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/03/01/opinion/polls/main2528357.shtml
. According to a 2011 CBS news poll 51 percent of
Americans said that they disapproved of the healthcare law, versus 35 percent who approved of it. See
http://www.american.com/archive/datapoint-entries/healthcare-update
.

10
Jonathan Haidt, “The New Synthesis in Moral Psychology,”
Science
316, no. 5827 (May 18, 2007): 998–1002.

11
George Lakoff,
Don't Think of an Elephant
! (Chelsea Green Publishing, 2004). Another reason why statists win the moral debates about our system is that they have figured out better than the right how to “frame” the arguments. The master of political argument framing is George Lakoff, a linguist at the University of California, Berkeley. In his 2004 bestseller
Don't Think of an Elephant
!, Lakoff argues that when it comes to successful politics, those who control the moral language get to frame the debate and win the hearts of voters. In progressive framing, free enterprise advocates are rigid and selfish, and their inability to make a strong moral case for freedom has only reinforced this view.

12
Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776.

13
Virginia Declaration of Rights, June 12, 1776.

14
Philip S. Foner, ed., “Thomas Jefferson to Henry Lee, May 8, 1825,”
The Basic Writings of Thomas Jefferson
(Halcyon House, 1950), 802.

15
Yasmine Ryan, “How Tunisia's Revolution Began,” Al Jazeera, January 26, 2011,
http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth/features/2011/01/2011126121815985483.html
; Yasmine Ryan, “The Tragic Life of a Street Vendor,” Al Jazeera, January 20, 2011,
http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth/features/2011/01/201111684242518839.html
.

16
Leon Aron, “Everything You Think You Know About the Collapse of the Soviet Union Is Wrong,”
Foreign Policy
, July-August 2011,
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/06/20/everything_you_think_you_know _about_the_collapse_of_the_soviet_union_is_wrong

17
Ronald Reagan, State of the Union Address, January 27, 1987,
http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=34430#axzz1RL21sVlN

18
Charles A. Murray,
Losing Ground: American social policy, 1950–1980
(Basic Books, 1984).

19
Thomas Jefferson,
Notes on the State of Virginia
, ed. Frank Shuffelton (Penguin Books, 1999).

20
Franklin D. Roosevelt, “Annual Message to Congress,” January 4, 1935,
The Public Papers and Addresses of Franklin D. Roosevelt, vol. 4, The Court Disapproves, 1935
, ed. Samuel Rosenman (Random House, 1938).

21
Murray,
Losing Ground
.

22
The legislation to reform welfare was the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 (PRWORA).

23
U.S. Bureau of the Census, “Poverty in the United States: 1999”; “Income, Poverty, and Health Insurance Coverage: 2003”;
http://www.whitehouse.gov/infocus/welfarereform
; John J. DiIulio Jr., “Older & Wiser?”
The Weekly Standard
011, no. 1 (2005).

24
John Ifcher, “The Happiness of Single Mothers after Welfare Reform,”
The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy
11, no. 1 (2011): 4–22.

CHAPTER TWO

1
Catherine Rampell, “The Self-Employed Are the Happiest,” New York Times Economix Blog, September 16, 2009,
http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/09/16/the-self-employed-are-the-happiest/

2
For salary information, see
http://www.cbsalary.com/national-salary-chart.aspx?specialty=Small+Business+Owner&cty=&sid=&kw=Small +Business+Owner&jn=jn037&edu=&tid=105988
;
http://www.cbsalary.com/national-salary-chart.aspx?specialty=Small+Business+Owner&cty=&sid=&kw=Small+Business+Owner&jn=jn037&edu=&tid=105988
. On the benefit differential between public and private workers, see Andrew Biggs and Jason Richwine, “Comparing Federal and Private Sector Compensation,” American Enterprise Institute, Economic Policy Working Paper 2011-02,
http://www.aei.org/docLib/AEI-Working-Paper-on-Federal-Pay-May-2011.pdf

3
Lymari Morales, “Self-employed Workers Clock the Most Hours Each Week,”
Gallup.com
, August 26, 2009,
http://www.gallup.com/poll/122510/Self-Employed-Workers-Clock-Hours-Week.aspx

4
Richard A. Easterlin, “Does Economic Growth Improve the Human Lot? Some Empirical Evidence,” in
Nations and households in economic growth: Essays in honor of Moses Abramovitz
, eds. Paul A. David and Melvin W. Reder (Academic Press Inc, 1974), 89–125

5
More recently, economists Betsey Stevenson and Justin Wolfers have questioned the Easterlin Paradox, citing Gallup public opinion surveys from around the world. They conclude that rising national income levels do indeed raise national levels of subjective well-being. See Betsey Stevenson and Justin Wolfers, “Economic Growth and Subjective Well-Being: Reassessing the Easterlin Paradox,” National Bureau of Economic Research, Working Paper No. 14282, August 2008,
http://www.nber.org/papers/w14282.pdf
. Economists over the decades have found other ways to examine the relationship between income and happiness. In a recent study, Nobel laureate Daniel Kahneman and his Princeton University colleague Angus Deaton analyzed a survey of 450,000 Americans in 2008 and 2009. The survey asked respondents to not only evaluate the quality of their lives, but also to report on their moods and levels of stress. They found that people who reported they were poor said that earning more money raised their mood, lowered their likelihood of depression, decreased stress, and made them more likely to evaluate the overall quality of their lives as higher. But this effect evaporated at about $75,000 per year in annual income. After that, people continued to
say
their life was getting better, but they actually got no happier: Their mood was not significantly brighter, they were no less susceptible to depression, and they experienced no less stress than they did at a lower income level. See Daniel Kahneman and Angus Deaton, “High income improves evaluation of life but not emotional well-being,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, September 7, 2010, doi: 10.1073/pnas.1011492107.

6
James A. Davis, Tom W. Smith, and Peter V. Marsden,
General Social Surveys, 1972–2004
(Roper Center for Public Opinion Research, University of Connecticut, 2004).

7
Richard Easterlin, “The Worldwide Standard of Living Since 1800,”
Journal of Economic Perspectives
14, no. 1 (2000): 7–26

8
Philip Brickman, Dan Coates, and Ronnie Janoff-Bulman, “Lottery Winners and Accident Victims: Is Happiness Relative?”
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology
36, no. 8 (1978): 917–927,
http://education.ucsb.edu/janeconoley/ed197/documents/brickman_lotterywinnersandaccidentvictims.pdf

9
Adam Smith,
The Theory of Moral Sentiments
(Oxford University Press, 1759, 1976), 149.

10
Richard Easterlin, “Explaining Happiness,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 100:19, September 16, 2003, 11176–11183.

11
Roper-Starch Organization, Roper Reports 79-1 (Roper Center, University of Connecticut, 1979).

12
Roper-Starch Organization, Roper Reports 95-1 (Roper Center, University of Connecticut, 1995).

13
George Orwell,
1984
, ed. Erich Fromm (Harcourt, 1949), 58.

14
Darrin M. McMahon,
Happiness: A History
(Atlantic Monthly Press, 2006), 403.

15
1996 General Social Survey. This analysis uses a probit estimation to model the likelihood of saying one is “very happy” on a dummy variable indicating one feels “very successful” or “completely successful,” income, and the other demographics listed. The coefficients are evaluated at the margin using the mean value of the regressors. James A. Davis, Tom W. Smith, and Peter V. Marsden,
General Social Surveys, 1972–2004
(Storrs, Conn.: The Roper Center for Public Opinion Research, University of Connecticut, 2004).

16
John Mirowsky and Catherine E. Ross. Aging, Status, and Sense of Control (ASOC), 1995, 1998, 2001 [United States] [Computer file]. ICPSR03334-v2. Ohio State University [producer], 2001. Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 2005-12-15. In these data, people were asked whether they agreed or disagreed with the statement that they were responsible for their own successes. Those who “agreed” or “agreed strongly” said they felt sad, on average, 0.96 days per week. Those who “disagreed” or “disagreed strongly” were sad an average of 1.2 days per week.

17
Joseph A. Schumpeter,
The Theory of Economic Development
, trans. R. Opie (Harvard University Press, 1934).

18
“BET's Robert Johnson to Obama: Stop Attacking the Wealthy,” Real Clear Politics Video, October 2, 2011,
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2011/10/02/bets_robert_johnson_to_obama_stop_attacking_the_wealthy.html

19
James A. Davis, Tom W. Smith, and Peter V. Marsden,
General Social Surveys, 1972–2006
(Storrs, Conn.: The Roper Center for Public Opinion Research, University of Connecticut, 2006).

20
J. J. Froh, J. Fan, R. A. Emmons, G. Bono, E. S. Huebner, and P. Watkins, “Measuring Gratitude in Youth: Assessing the Psychometric Properties of Adult Gratitude Scales in Children and Adolescents,”
Psychological Assessment
, March 28, 2011, advance online publication, doi: 10.1037/a0021590.