It's the customers, stupid

(Like a lot of topics, there are surely more scholarly viewpoints on economics, but because everyone's involved in it and affected by it, I think we're all entitled to a reasoned opinion.)

Whenever debates on increasing taxes on the wealthy and corporations come up, the conservatives generally go to the very tangible bottom-line arguments about wealth redistribution, with some class warfare accusations thrown in to give their arguments a dash of cultural incredulity. Liberals go heavy on the bleeding heart cultural arguments, trying to appeal to notions of fairness and sympathy for the less fortunate, and act like money isn't an issue.

While the bleeding heart arguments do resonate with me, it'd be insane to support something just because it makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. If that was it, I'd give to panhandlers all the time for that quick nice-guy feeling, all the while encouraging and enabling behavior that nobody thinks is good. (Ever see people give to panhandlers inside a restaurant? Ugh.) The main reason anybody should be advocating higher taxes to support government work projects and social programs is because it'll make us all richer.

Just about anybody who works in a high-income profession relies on broader economic activity. We rely on large numbers of people buying more goods and services so that we benefit either directly if they buy products and services offered by the companies we work for, or indirectly when they buy the goods and services produced by our clients, or even less directly when the quarterly filings come in and the companies in our portfolios show stellar sales and revenue.

Absolutely none of this happens when there aren't customers to buy these goods and services. And when there are no customers, there are no profits. So my company might lose clients or have less sales. So it may need to cut costs and lay a bunch of people off. Or my stocks might tank from poor earnings reports. So I'll have to re-think getting that new computer or 60" plasma. So I become one less shopper at the AAPL store or AMZN. And the cycle repeats.

If lack of tax revenue forces government to cut medicare and social security, suddenly I have to consider setting cash aside should I need to support my elderly mother. If you have kids, you may need to re-think using the public schools, and look to spending on private. Or possibly moving altogether to a better, more expensive part of town with solid schools. And again, even if we're gainfully employed in the middle class, we're a few less customers at the BBY or the F or GM dealership.

Through work programs we can create moderate income jobs for people that need to get a computer to replace their 8-year-old Compaq still running MSFT Windows 2000, buy a digital TV instead of the dumb half-assed $40 adapter box, maybe sign up for a VZ or S cellular plan (a career necessity these days), and of course, buy food and clothing at the WMT or M. All this while fixing roads, bridges, and pipelines so that we don't have to contend with catastrophic infrastructure failures that end up costing everybody even more money. Infrastructure that, by the way, support vital delivery services such as FDX and UPS, that allows them to charge rates low enough so that most of the stuff you buy from AMZN will have the free 3-5 day shipping. Which makes you that much more likely to click 'Buy'.

This goes for the Social Security and Welfare too. The money doesn't just go into a hole. It goes right back into the economy when they become customers (instead of shoplifters, if worst comes to worst) at the SWY or TGT. Maybe even take the kids to MCD every once in a while.With sufficient income, they might even need to open accounts at WFC or BAC. Are there lazy douchebags on welfare? Sure, but so long as I don't have to hang out with them, get mugged or burglarized by them, and not have them become homeless and screw up my downtown area, I'm not too bothered by it. But by all means, seek and prosecute fraud.

Frankly, I'm sick and tired of the bleeding heart stuff. I like captial-L Liberal policies because they make sense for me as somebody who wants to live comfortably and even maybe get obscenely filthy rich. This is the sort of thing we Liberals/Progressives should open with. Feeling like a good human being stuff just helps me sleep at night, which is important, but that's far from the only reason.