Robert Samuelson March 2, 2013

“There is no parallel in history to the [American] ex
periment offree government on this scale. The scale accounts for a great deal,including . . . pessimism about the present or the future of America.”

— Scottish historian D.W. Brogan in “The American Character,” 1944

Just why is American politics so dysfunctional? One answer is that bothparties, for different reasons, have created self-serving mythologiesthat reward them for not dealing with pressing problems that, thoughdaunting, are hardly sudden or secret. For proof, see Paul Taylor’s newbook, “The Next America.” Taylor oversees many of the Pew Research Center’s opinion surveys. Hismasterful synthesis of polls shows that three familiar mega-trends lieat the core of America’s political and social stalemate.

First,immigration. By 2050, immigrants and their U.S.-born children areprojected to represent 37 percent of the population, slightly higherthan in 1900, when the country last experienced mass immigration.Between now and mid-century, immigrants and their children will generate two-thirds of population growth.

The question is whethernewcomers are constructively assimilated or whether — to use Taylor’sacid characterization of popular fears — they “take our jobs, drain ourresources, threaten our language . . . and import crime.”Either way, America’s profile changes. In 1960, 85 percent of Americanswere white and 10 percent were black. Now, 63 percent are white, 13percent black, 17 percent Hispanic and 5 percent Asian. In 2050, thoseshares are projected to be 47 percent white, 13 percent black, 28percent Hispanic and 8 percent Asian.

Second, family breakdown.In 2011, unmarried women accounted for 41 percent of U.S. births, upfrom 5 percent in 1960. The trend affects all major groups. The rate is29 percent for whites, 53 percent among Hispanics and 72 percent amongAfrican Americans. Although 60 percent of single mothers have live-inboyfriends, half of these relationships end within five years. Singleparenthood’s stigma is gone.

This may shape the future middleclass because growing up in a single-parent home puts children at adisadvantage. Children in two-parent homes — despite millions ofexceptions — are “healthier, do better academically, [and] get into less trouble as adolescents,” writes Taylor, summarizing social-scienceresearch.

Finally, aging. Every day 10,000 baby boomers turn 65.The retiree flood is swamping the federal budget. By 2022, SocialSecurity, Medicare and the non-child share of Medicaid will exceed halfthe budget, up from 30 percent in 1990, projects an Urban Institute study. To make room for the elderly, defense and many domestic programs are being relentlessly squeezed.

There’s no generational justice, argues Taylor: “The young today are payingtaxes to support a level of benefits for the old that they themselveshave no prospect of receiving when they become old.”

America’s future rests heavily on how thesemega-trends play out. Democracy works best when the political system can mediate between the often-inconsistent demands of public opinion andlarger national needs. This, America’s leaders can’t or won’t do. Facedwith immutable trends, they have not adapted to change. Instead, theypander to partisans with soothing, though outdated, stereotypes.Nostalgia poses as policy when it is actually a marketing strategy.

Liberals won’t come to terms with aging. Believing that spending on the elderlyand near-elderly constitutes the essence of progressivism — and ignoring the affluence of many elderly — some liberals even support raisingthese benefits. The paradoxical result is that the pro-government partyhas become an instrument of anti-government policies, becauseaccommodating all the elderly’s benefits means quietly condoning deepcuts in most other programs.

By its nature, this brand ofliberalism discriminates against the young. To be sure, their economicproblems stem heavily from the Great Recession (in 2012, 40 percent of men ages 18 to 31 lived with their parents). But shrinking government services and looming tax increases compound the damage.

Conservatives have parallel hang-ups. They can’t adapt to the permanence of BigGovernment or the presence of so many immigrants, including an estimated 11 million who are here illegally. Even if unworthy government programs are cut, federal spending will easily exceed one-fifth of national income, which is more than today’s taxes will cover. Higher taxes, contrary to GOP dogma, will be needed. Similarly, illegal immigrants won’t conveniently vanish.

Government can’t do much about the decline in marriage. But it isn’t handcuffedelsewhere. What’s needed is a bargain in which Democrats trim retireebenefits (Social Security and Medicare) and, in exchange, Republicansdeal forthrightly on immigration and taxes. This seems unlikely, because it would require both parties to accept the world as it is, not as they wish it to be.

Appraising America’s democratic prospects in themid-1940s, historian Brogan wrote that “the pessimists have always beenwrong.” Maybe, but they’re looking prescient now.

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