Bleeding Heart Tightwads

The New York Times ^ | December 21, 2008 | NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF

[Amelia]

This holiday season is a time to examine who’s been naughty and who’s been nice, but I’m unhappy with my findings. The problem is this: We liberals are personally stingy.

Liberals show tremendous compassion in pushing for generous government spending to help the neediest people at home and abroad. Yet when it comes to individual contributions to charitable causes, liberals are cheapskates.

Arthur Brooks, the author of a book on donors to charity, “Who Really Cares,” cites data that households headed by conservatives give 30 percent more to charity than households headed by liberals. A study by Google found an even greater disproportion: average annual contributions reported by conservatives were almost double those of liberals.

Other research has reached similar conclusions. The “generosity index” from the Catalogue for Philanthropy typically finds that red states are the most likely to give to nonprofits, while Northeastern states are least likely to do so.

The upshot is that Democrats, who speak passionately about the hungry and homeless, personally fork over less money to charity than Republicans — the ones who try to cut health insurance for children.

[oblomov]

Thanks for the ping.

The Brooks study Kristof references in his article has similar conclusions as Peter Schweizer's excellent book, Makers and Takers. Schweizer contends that left-wing, pro-welfare state public policy leads to an infantilized citizenry that is self-centered and hedonistic rather than productive and conscientious about personal responsibility to others. Schweizer presents survey data that shows that liberals generally expect other people or the government to take care of people in need (even a family member), rather than believing that they have some responsibility to help.

Schweizer implies that because liberals have less self-control and are more conceited, they project these attributes on to others, and so they advocate policy that is designed to restrain the base instincts that are most prominent in themselves.

I think this may be true in general, but I do know some liberals who have a very strong sense of personal responsibility, and are highly productive and conscientious, but they assume everyone else is a selfish child who needs the firm hand of the state to keep them from hurting themselves or others at every turn.

Either way, it is a type of misanthropy that I find abhorrent. Rather than inspire people to become better, it seems to inspire them to become worse.

[Alia]

I don't know that I can add to your superb post. And thank you for the book commend "Makers and Takers" (Schweizer).

I cannot argue with a single point in your post; and I concur with yours in re "but they [liberals] assume everyone else is a selfish child" and Mrs. Schweizer' "liberals have less self-control and are more conceited, they project these attributes on to others".

Merry Christmas, Oblomov!

[WOBBLY BOB]

***CA: Union-founded nonprofit spent zero on its charitable purpose in two years (SEIU)***

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-union13-2008dec13,0,6257988.story?track=rss

A nonprofit organization founded by California’s largest union local reported spending nothing on its charitable purpose — to develop housing for low-income workers — during at least two of the four years it has been operating, federal records show.

[syriacus]

I noticed that many of the negative comments at Kristof’s website were posted by Liberals who did not seem to read all of the op-ed.

If they had read all of Kristof’s column they would have known that many of the “facts” in their counter-arguments were already disproved by Brooks.

Brooks did a wonderful job of anticipating what the deniers would say.

[Amelia]

I noticed the same. It was as if they read the first 3 paragraphs, but not the rest of the article.

There *were* quite a few comments, though. I rather liked being able to engage the liberals on their own turf, but I wish the format allowed for more discussion.