Author: telegraph

How Affordable Care Act Repeal And Replace Plans Might Shift Health Insurance Tax Credits

Posted on March 7, 2017

An important part of the repeal and replacement discussions around the Affordable Care Act (ACA) will involve the type and amount of subsidies that people get to help them afford health insurance. This is particularly important for lower and moderate income individuals who do not have access to coverage at work and must purchase coverage directly.

The ACA provides three types of financial assistance to help people afford health coverage: Medicaid expansion for those with incomes below 138% of poverty (the Supreme Court later ruled this to be at state option); refundable premium tax credits for people with incomes from 100% to 400% of the poverty level who purchase coverage through federal or state marketplaces; cost-sharing subsidies for people with incomes from 100% to 250% of poverty to provide lower deductibles and copays when purchasing silver plans in a marketplace.

This analysis focuses on alternative ways to provide premium assistance for people purchasing individual market coverage, explaining how they work, providing examples of how they’re calculated, and presenting estimates of how assistance overall would change for current ACA marketplace enrollees. Issues relating to changing Medicaid or methods of subsidizing cost-sharing will be addressed in other analyses.

Premium Tax Credits Under the ACA and Current Replacement Proposals

The ACA and leading replacement proposals rely on refundable tax credits to help individual market enrollees pay for premiums, although the credit amounts are set quite differently. The House Leadership proposal released on March 6, the American Health Care Act, proposes refundable tax credits which vary with age (with a phase-out for high-income enrollees) and grow annually with inflation. The tax credits under the ACA vary with family income and the cost of insurance where people live, as well as age, and grow annually if premiums increase.

These various tax credit approaches can have quite different implications for different groups of individual market purchasers. For example, the tax credits under the ACA are higher for people with lower incomes than for people with higher incomes, and no credit is provided for individuals with incomes over 400% of poverty. The current replacement proposal, in contrast, is flat for incomes up to $75,000 for an individual and $150,000 for a married couple, and so would provide relatively more assistance to people with upper-middle incomes. Similarly, the ACA tax credits are relatively higher in areas with higher premiums (like many rural areas), while the replacement proposal credits do not vary by location. If premiums grow more rapidly than inflation over time (which they generally have), the replacement proposal tax credits will grow more slowly than those provided under the ACA.

The next section describes the differing tax credit approaches in more detail and draws out some of the implications for different types of purchasers.

How the Different Tax Credits Are Calculated

The ACA provides tax credits for individuals with family incomes from 100% to 400% of poverty ($11,880 to $47,520 for a single individual in 2017) if they are not eligible for employer-provided or public coverage and if they purchase individual market coverage in the federal or a state marketplace. The tax credit amounts are calculated based on the family income of eligible individuals and the cost of coverage in the area where the live. More specifically, the ACA tax credit for an eligible individual is the difference between a specified percentage of his or her income (Table 1) and the premium of the second-lowest-cost silver plan (referred to as the benchmark premium) available in the area in which they live. There is no tax credit available if the benchmark premium is less than the specified percentage of premium (which can occur for younger purchasers with relatively higher incomes) or if family income falls outside of the 100% to 400% of poverty range. For families, the premiums for family members are added together (including up to 3 children) and compared to specified income percentages. ACA tax credits are made available in advance, based on income information provided to the marketplace, and reconciled based on actual income when a person files income taxes the following.

Take, for example, a person age 40 with income of $30,000, which is 253% of poverty. At this income, the person’s specified percentage of income is 8.28% in 2017, which means that the person receives a tax credit if he or she has to pay more than 8.28% of income (or $2,485 annually) for the second-lowest-cost silver premium where he or she lives. If we assume a premium of $4,328 (the national average benchmark premium for a person age 40 in 2017), the person’s tax credit would be the difference between the benchmark premium and the specified percentage of income, or $4,328 – $2,485 = $1,843 (or $154 per month).

The American Health Care Act takes a simpler approach and specifies the actual dollar amounts for a new refundable tax credit that could be used to purchase individual market coverage. The amounts vary only with age up until an income of $75,000 for a single individual, at which point they begin to phase out. Tax credits range from $2,000 for people under age 30, to $2,500 for people ages 30 to 39, $3,000 for people age 40 to 49, $3,500 for people age 50 to 59, and $4,000 for people age 60 and over starting in 2020. Eligibility for the tax credit phases out starting at income above $75,000 for single individuals (the credit is reduced, but not below zero, by 10 cents for every dollar of income above this threshold, reaching zero at an income of $95,000 for single individuals up to age 29 or $115,000 for individuals age 60 and older). For joint filers, credits begin to phase out at an income of $150,000 (the tax credit is reduced to zero at an income of $190,000 for couples up to age 29; it is reduced to zero at income $230,000 for couples age 60 or older; and it is reduced to zero at income of $290,000 for couples claiming the maximum family credit amount). People who sign up for public programs such as Medicare, Medicaid, public employee health benefit programs, would not be eligible for a tax credit. The proposal further limits eligibility for tax credits to people who do not have an offer available for employer-provided health benefits.

Table 2 shows how projected ACA tax credits in 2020 compare to what would be provided under the American Health Care Act for people at various incomes, ages, and geographic areas. To show the ACA amounts in 2020, we inflated all 2017 premiums based on projections for direct purchase spending per enrollee from the National Health Expenditure Accounts. This method applies the same premium growth across all ages and geographic locations. Note that the table does not include cost-sharing assistance under the ACA that lowers deductibles and copayments for low-income marketplace enrollees. For example, in 2016, people making between 100 – 150% of poverty enrolled in a silver plan on healthcare.gov received cost-sharing assistance worth $1,440; those with incomes between 150 – 200% of poverty received $1,068 on average; and those with incomes between 200 – 250% of poverty received $144 on average.

Under the ACA in 2020, we project that a typical 40-year-old making $20,000 per year would be eligible for $4,143 in premium tax credits (not including the additional cost-sharing subsidies to lower his or her deductibles and copayments), while under the American Health Care Act, this person would be eligible $3,000. For context, we project that the average ACA premium for a 40-year-old in 2020 would be $5,101 annually (meaning the tax credit in the ACA would cover 81% of the total premium) for a benchmark silver plan with comprehensive benefits and reduced cost-sharing. A $3,000 tax credit for this same individual under the American Health Care Act would represent 59% of the average 40-year-old benchmark silver premium under the ACA

Generally, the ACA has higher tax credit amounts than the replacement plan for lower-income people – especially for those who are older and live in higher-cost areas – and lower credits for those with higher incomes. Unlike the ACA, the replacement plan provides tax credits to people over 400% percent of the poverty level (phasing out around 900% of poverty for a single person), as well as to people current buying individual market coverage outside of the marketplaces (not included in this analysis).

While replacement plan tax credits vary by age – by a factor of 2 to 1 for older adults relative to younger ones – the variation is substantially less than under the ACA. The big differences in ACA tax credits at different ages is due to the fact that premiums for older adults can be three times the level of premiums for younger adults under the ACA, but all people at a given income level are expected to pay the same percentage of their income towards a benchmark plan. The tax credit fills in the difference, and this amount is much higher for older adults. These differences by age would be even further magnified under the American Health Care Act (which permits premiums to vary by a factor of 5 to 1 due to age). Before the ACA, premiums for older adults were typically four or five times the premiums charged to younger adults.

The tax credits in the ACA vary significantly with premium costs in an area (see Table 2 and Figure 2). At a given income level and age, people receive bigger tax credits in a higher premium area like Mobile, Alabama and smaller tax credits in a lower premium area like Reno, Nevada. Under the ACA in 2017, premiums in Mobile, Alabama and Reno, Nevada approximately represent the 75th and 25th percentile, respectively.

The disparities between the ACA tax credits and those in the American Health Care Act will therefore vary noticeably across the country.

The same general pattern can be seen for families as individuals, with lower-income families – and particularly lower-income families in higher-cost areas – receiving larger tax credits under the ACA, while middle-income families in lower-cost areas would receive larger tax credits under the American Health Care Act (Figure 3).

Figure 4 below shows how tax credits under the ACA differ from those in the American Health Care Act for a couple in their 60’s with no children. In this scenario, because premiums for older adults are higher and the ACA ties tax credits to the cost of premiums, a 60-year-old couple would receive larger tax credits under the ACA than the American Health Care Act at lower and middle incomes, but would receive a larger tax credit under the American Health Care Act at higher incomes.

Estimates of Tax Credits Under the ACA and the American Health Care Act Over Time

We estimated the average tax credits that current ACA marketplace enrollees are receiving under the ACA and what they would qualify for if the American Health Care Act were in place.

The average estimated tax credit received by ACA marketplace enrollees in 2017 is $3,617 on an annual basis, and that this amount will rise to $4,615 by 2020 based on projected growth rates from the Congressional Budget Office. This includes the 81% who receive premium subsidies as well as the 19% who do not.

We estimate – based on the age distribution of marketplace enrollees – that current enrollees would receive an average tax credit under the American Health Care Act of $2,957 in 2020, or 36% less than under the ACA (see Table 3 and Figure 3). While many people would receive lower tax credits under the Affordable Health Care Act, some would receive more assistance, notably the 19% of current marketplace enrollees who do not qualify for ACA subsidies.

While ACA tax credits grow as premiums increase over time, the tax credits in the American Health Care Act are indexed to inflation plus 1 percentage point. Based on CBO’s projections of ACA tax credit increases and inflation, the disparity between the average credits under the ACA and the two replacement plans would widen over time. The average tax credit current marketplace enrollees would receive under the American Health Care Act would be 41% lower than under the ACA in 2022 and 44% lower in 2027.

Discussion

Like the ACA itself, the American Health Care Act includes refundable tax credits to help make premiums more affordable for people buying their own insurance. This might seem like an area where a replacement plan could preserve a key element of the ACA. However, the tax credits are, in fact, structured quite differently, with important implications for affordability and which groups may be winners or losers if the ACA is repealed and replaced.

For current marketplace enrollees, the American Health Care Act would provide substantially lower tax credits overall than the ACA on average. People who are lower income, older, or live in high premium areas would be particularly disadvantaged under the American Health Care Act. People with incomes over 400% of the poverty level – including those buying individual market insurance outside of the marketplaces – do not get any financial assistance under the ACA but many would receive tax credits under the replacement proposal.

The underlying details of health reform proposals, such as the size and structure of health insurance tax credits, matter crucially in determining who benefits and who is disadvantaged.

Trends In U.S. Corrections

Posted on March 7, 2017

From The Sentencing Project, we present a fact sheet of Trends in U.S. Corrections, including prison populations, state and federal expenditures, the number of people in prisons and jail for various offenses, facts on women and race, as well as much more.

School Choice 101

Posted on March 7, 2017

School Choice is the term given to a set of government programs that provide families with alternative school options other than those that are publicly provided, to which students are generally assigned by their family’s location of residence.

These programs are available in only a handful of states and include the voucher program, charter schools, tax credit scholarships, individual tax credits, and education savings accounts. The goal of implementing school choice programs is to raise productivity in public schools by encouraging competition and innovation in the education ‘market.’ The hypothesis about choice and productivity is quite straightforward: when students can leave and money follows students (even if imperfectly or indirectly), less productive schools will lose students to more productive schools.

What is the voucher program?

There are several different types of school choice programs, the best known of these is the voucher program. The voucher program was first introduced in 1955 by Nobel laureate and economist Milton Friedman. Because “a stable and democratic society is impossible without widespread acceptance of some common set of values and without a minimum degree of literacy and knowledge on the part of most citizens,” Mr. Friedman wrote, the government should pay for all children to go to school.

Vouchers are used for tuition at private schools of choice but are funded through public money, typically through income and state tax. Whereas charter and magnet schools are public schools of choice and often do not require vouchers, this program gives parents an alternative to oftentimes poorly performing public schools.

Today, there are 25 operating voucher programs in 14 states—Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Louisiana (2), Maine, Maryland, Mississippi (2), North Carolina (2), Ohio (5), Oklahoma, Utah, Vermont, Wisconsin (4)—and Washington, D.C.

How does the voucher program work?

Vouchers are funded through taxpayer dollars, typically from income and state tax. The state gives the family a tuition voucher, and the family then spends the money at a private school of their choice.

What are the other school choice programs?

There are several other types of voucher-like programs and can vary from state to state. The most commonly known programs are:

Tax Credit Scholarships:

In this program, the state gives a tax credit to an individual or a business who donates money to an approved scholarship program. That approved scholarship program then gives the money to a family to spend on tuition at a private school.

Education Savings Accounts:

Here, the state takes money or a portion of the money they would have put into the school district for a particular child and puts it into a special account. The parent is then allowed to take money out of that account and spend it on approved education expenses. These expenses could include a private tutor, educational therapy, or tuition at a private school.

Why is school choice controversial?

The primary source of contention among those who are opposed to school choice is the claim that the programs siphon money away from the public school systems, thus reinforcing the notion that public schools are ineffective and essentially setting them up for failure.

Proponents of school choice offer a different perspective, saying that “When students leave a public school using vouchers, the public school is relieved of the duty/costs of educating those students.” However, the problem becomes evident when too many students (and their funding) are drained from the public school system entirely.

There are also those who believe the voucher program threatens the separation of church and state, since many of the families who use vouchers opt to send their children to a religious private school. The National Education Association has stated that, “privatization [choice] strategies are about subsidizing tuition for students in private schools, not expanding opportunities for low-income children.”

What have been the results of school choice programs so far?

When we talk about whether school choice programs ‘work,’ we’re not only talking about the overall academic success of an individual student, but also the overall improvement of the public school system in America.

Formally, the success of a school is measured as achievement per dollar spent. When public funds are siphoned away from public schools in large quantites, it can have a measurable negative impact on the overall performance of that public school.

In a study released by The Institute of Education Sciences, the overall performance of 36 charter middle schools across 15 states was shown to be, on average, “neither more nor less successful than traditional public schools in improving student achievement, behavior, and school progress.”

Sources

Institute of Educational Studies

Swedish Economic Policy Review

Education Week

Private School Review

Anti-Defamation League

The New York Times – “Public Money Finds Back Door to Private Schools”

The New York Times – “Dismal Results from Vouchers Surprise Researchers as DeVos Era Begins”

Ed Data

[1] “Charter School Financial Impact Model Final Report,” MGT of America, September 11, 2014, http://nashvillepublicmedia.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/MNPS-Charter-Schools-Financial-Impact-Review.pdf

[2] “Review: Fiscal Impact of Charter Schools on LAUSD,” MGT of America, May2016, stofcharterschools.org/ccs/eir/

[3] “Which Districts Get Into Financial Trouble and Why: Michigan’s Story,” David Arsen, Thomas A. DeLuca, Yongmei Ni, and Michael Bates, Michigan State University, November 2015, http://www.education.msu.edu/epc/library/papers/documents/WP51-Which-Districts-Get-Into-Financial-Trouble-Arsen.pdf

[4] Fiscal Impacts of Charter Schools: Lessons from New York, Robert Bifulco and Randall Reback, Columbia University, New York, NY, http://www.columbia.edu/~rr2165/pdfs/nycharterfiscal.pdf

Calling For Peace, Unity, Religious Freedom At Rutgers’ Muslims For Peace Event

Posted on March 5, 2017

Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard (HI-02) delivered the keynote address at the 10th Annual Prophet Muhammad Day event at Rutgers University today. The event, hosted by Muslims for Peace, is focused on bringing communities together to celebrate the legacy of compassion, mercy, and justice of the Prophet Muhammad, and to stand together against anti-Muslim rhetoric and policies.

Namaste. Salam Alaikum.

Aloha. Thank you for inviting me to be with you as we all come together from different faiths and spiritual paths to stand in solidarity for freedom and peace.

Sadly, as we look around us at the chaos in the world today, we see people who are inflicting violence and terror upon others in the name of religion and identity.

On January 29, six people were killed and nineteen wounded as they were fired upon while they prayed in a Quebec City mosque.

On February 16, an ISIS-affiliated suicide bomber killed at least seventy-five people while they worshipped at a shrine to the Sufi saint Lal Shahbaz Qalandar in Pakistan—a place that was tragically targeted for embracing worshippers of all faiths and sects side by side.

Since the beginning of 2017, hundreds of tombstones have been toppled at Jewish cemeteries in Philadelphia and St. Louis and nearly 100 bomb threats have been called into Jewish schools and community centers across our nation.

In February of last year, ISIS beheaded a senior Hindu priest named Jogeswar Roy at a temple in northern Bangladesh, and injured two others. Just a few months before this, ISIS conducted attacks on Shia mosques and shrines in Bangladesh killing and injuring worshippers.

The perpetrators of these horrific actions have no connection with the spiritual love that lies at the heart of all religions—the love that has the power to overcome differences and bring people together.

No matter where you’re from, no matter what religion you practice, your ethnicity, race, or anything else—what is it that can bring us together as people? It is, what we call in Hawaii, aloha… sincere, deep love and respect for other people as children of God.

The sectarian spirit that fuels enmity and violence between members of different religions has been described by the great saint Bhaktivinode Thakur as “the greatest enemy of mankind.”

When a person thinks, I am a Christian, this other person is a Muslim, therefore he is my enemy, or I am a Muslim, this other person is a Hindu, therefore she is my enemy, they reveal their own lack of spiritual depth. No religion teaches this, and any understanding of any religion that adopts this divisive attitude proves itself false by doing so.

As a Vaishnava Hindu, a devotee of Sri Krishna, I recognize and respect both Jesus Christ and the Prophet Mohammed as messengers of God, messengers of love, peace, and universal brotherhood. Prophet Mohammed warned against any maltreatment of people of other faiths, saying:

“Beware! Whoever is cruel and hard on a non-Muslim minority, or curtails their rights, or burdens them with more than they can bear, or takes anything from them against their free will; I (Prophet Muhammad) will complain against the person on the Day of Judgment.” (Abu Dawud)

I was raised in Hawaii in what I call a “faith-inclusive” family. I never felt I had to choose loyalty to the New Testament over the Bhagavad Gita. It really wasn’t until my late teens that I became aware of the ugly concept of sectarianism.

According to Vaishnava Hinduism, there is only one Supreme Being, but He has many beautiful and wonderful names. God is one, no matter what name we call Him, and it is the loving exchange that each of us has with God that is true spirituality.

The Hindu scripture, the Brahma Samhita, states, “The soul is eternal and is for eternity without a beginning, joined to the Supreme Lord by tie of an eternal kinship. The soul is transcendental spiritual potency.” (Brahma Samhita 5.21)

When we are tasting such love for God, we are able to see beyond our external differences and designations, and recognize that we are all relatives in the deepest sense.

By embracing this truth, which is a core message of all scriptures of the world, we can achieve real peace and harmony with others, no matter the different backgrounds we come from. Such tolerance, respect, and love for others, regardless of religion or any other external differences, is taught by Sri Krishna Chaitanya in His prayer:

“One should chant the Holy Name of the Lord in a humble state of mind, feeling oneself to be lower than the straw in the street; one should be more tolerant than the tree, devoid of all sense of false prestige, and ready to offer all respects to others. In such a state of mind one can chant the Holy Name of the Lord constantly.” (Sri Siksastakam)

The Quran states, “Humanity is but a single brotherhood. So make peace with your brethren.” (Quran 49:10)

The Sri Isopanishad, a Hindu scripture, states, “That person who sees everything in relation to the Supreme Lord, who sees all living entities as parts and parcels of the Lord, and who sees the Supreme Lord within everything, never hates anyone nor any being.” (Sri Isopanishad, Mantra 6)

The Bible states, “Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.” (Bible, John 4:8)

The essence of God is love, and central to love is freedom.

Our country’s Founding Fathers invoked our inalienable God-given right to life and liberty, and enshrined that right of freedom of religion in our US constitution, recognizing that everyone must be free to follow his or her conscience without fear of persecution. This right is something that comes from God, bestowed on every one of us, no matter who we are or where we are from, and which no one has the right or ability to take away.

It is truly wonderful that embedded in the very bedrock of our nation is this recognition of free will; of this intrinsic right of every individual to worship God as one chooses, or to not worship God; to adhere to any spiritual path or to no spiritual path. No one can make that decision for another person. It is our duty to guard and protect the right of all people to worship or not worship according to their conscience. This is the nature of love. Every person has the freedom to choose to give their heart and give their life to God or not. You can’t force someone to love God, or to love anyone.

As stated in the Quran: “To you be your religion, to me be mine.” (Quran 109:6)

By cultivating the understanding that each individual has the intrinsic right to follow a particular spiritual or religious path, or no path at all, and by recognizing that this right is given by God, not by man or government, we can maintain a pluralistic, peaceful society. Without this understanding, and a commitment to respect and uphold this right, there is no foundation for peace in the world.

The terror that we see perpetrated in the name of God today is in fact a refusal to honor the inherent freedom of all people that is given by God. So-called “religious terrorism” is born of an exclusivist ideology that says, my faith is the only legitimate faith, and that everyone who does not believe as I believe is inferior and must be converted, enslaved, raped, or killed.

Such acts of terror are also an admission of insecurity and doubt. Those who are confident in their own faith have no reason to attack the faith of others. It is only those who are fearful and devoid of love for God who believe that forcing their view on the rest of the world could ever be the will of God.

Groups like ISIS, al-Qaeda, and Boko Haram all share this divisive ideology in common, and it is also at the heart of the Wahhabi Salafist ideology sponsored and propagated by countries like Saudi Arabia. This exclusivist ideology is the opposite of real religion because it denies the inherent freedom of every individual to choose whether and how they want to love God or not, and it is the enemy of peace for all of humanity.

Therefore, in order to defeat this enemy, we not only need to defeat these terrorist groups militarily, we need to defeat them ideologically. Otherwise, those terrorists we kill on the battlefield will simply be replaced by others who have been indoctrinated into a perverse and violent understanding of religion.

How do we defeat this exclusivist ideology? We must confront this exclusivist, hateful ideology head-to-head, and defeat it with an inclusive ideology of love—a consciousness of love. Inclusiveness is born out of wisdom and love, knowing that every single person is a child of God, and we should love others as our brethren. We should appreciate and respect that every individual has the right to choose the spiritual path that they want.

Ultimately, the only way we can defeat terrorism is by wielding a superior truth. To defeat terrorism, every imam, priest, reverend, rabbi, guru, and spiritual teacher must articulate this central truth—that real religion is love, and love must be freely given, it cannot be forced. A loving relationship with God can only be initiated out of an individual’s free choice. When this truth is heard, understood, and accepted in all corners of the globe, then we will have peace.

This ideology of inclusivism, of aloha, of love and respect for others, needs to be promoted around the world in every mosque, temple, and church. Only this inclusive ideology of aloha can defeat the exclusive ideology of terrorism.

When a society fails to cultivate this love, and fails to respect individuals’ freedom of choice, such societies inevitably end up in great darkness and suffering.

Unfortunately, there are billions of people in the world who have been forced to live in societies where individual freedom of conscience and religion do not exist, where people who are followers of the “wrong religion” or of no religion are treated as lesser human beings, discriminated against, oppressed, forced to pay extra taxes, forced from their land, or worse yet, imprisoned, tortured, raped, or killed.

These examples may seem very extreme as we sit here in this nice, safe hall in New Jersey, under the protective umbrella of religious freedom.

But we must remember that there is not one place—not even our own nation—that is immune to the poison of religious bigotry.

Abraham Lincoln was attacked with accusations that he was not a Christian.

When John F. Kennedy ran for President, his political opponents tried to foment religious bigotry against his Catholicism.

When Barack Obama ran for president in 2007, people accused him of being Muslim, as if that would somehow disqualify him from becoming president.

When I first ran for Congress, my Republican opponent stated in a CNN interview that I shouldn’t be allowed to serve in Congress because my Hindu religion “doesn’t align with the constitutional foundation of the US government.” Last year, my Republican opponent stated that, “a vote for Tulsi is a vote for the devil,” because of my Hindu faith.

The message in each of these situations was simple: you will be punished politically for being of the “wrong religion.”

Nothing could be more un-American than this.

The only way to defeat this dark cloud of religious bigotry and hatred is when we stand together in the light of love.

As Martin Luther King, Jr. said, “Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.”

We must stand with people of all religions who are committed to pluralism and individual free choice. People like:

Mahmoud Al ‘Asali who was assassinated for courageously speaking out against ISIS’ brutal treatment of Christians in Mosul;

Khurram Zaki, a prominent Pakistani journalist and human rights activist who was assassinated because he was one of many Muslims courageously advocating for a pluralistic, tolerant, secular Pakistan;

Kenyan Muslims who shielded Christians from the attack of terrorists;

Jewish and Christian leaders in Victoria, Texas who opened their synagogue and churches to the Muslim community whose mosque burned down.

There are countless examples of such love and courage by individuals and communities who embrace and live by the true spiritual principles of peace, love, mercy, and tolerance; who are building coalitions of Christians, Buddhists, Hindus, Moslems, atheists, secularists, and more; who are risking their lives, bravely crying out for a peaceful, pluralistic society built on the bedrock of religious freedom.

So the challenge for each and every one of us here is—will we elevate and empower these champions of peace and a pluralistic society? Will we do what is necessary to defeat the destructive exclusivist ideology with one of love, aloha, and inclusiveness?

Or will we stand by, shake our heads, and do nothing?

We must act. For the sake of our families, our communities, our country, and all of humanity, we must stand with these brave souls, these warriors for peace.

Let us stand proudly as Americans, as defenders of our constitution, as defenders of freedom, as defenders of peace, as beacons of love.

Let us be brave and forceful in standing up for each other’s rights to live and worship freely and let us not be afraid to say that whoever threatens that right for any one of us will have to face all of us together.

Let us be inspired by the vision put forward by our nation’s founders, and challenge those fomenting religious bigotry to do the same.

Rather than pour fuel on the fire of darkness, divisiveness, and hatred, let us bring the light found in the aloha spirit to our lives, our country, and the world.

Let us be inspired as we join hands, working toward the day when everyone—whether they are Hindu, Buddhist, Christian, Jew, Muslim, or atheist—can live in peace and free from fear.

Let us confront hatred with love. Confront bigotry with aloha. Confront fear with courage.

Let us truly live aloha in our actions, in our words, and in our hearts.

Interview With Nina Turner: Right-To-Work Laws Are Weakening The Middle Class And The Economy

Posted on March 4, 2017

During her time in the Ohio Senate, Turner fought for legislation that would level the playing field for women and men—including introducing the “Viagra bill,” which would subject men to the same scrupulous levels of regulations women face over their reproductive choices—and her dedication has continued into her postlegislative role.

The Canton plant first opened in 2003, and Mississippi residents hoped it would be a boon to their local economy. Though Nissan says the factory has added $2.9 billion each year to the state’s economy, and created 25,000 jobs, the state still remains the poorest in the nation, and workers have spent nearly a decade and a half fighting for better conditions and fairer treatment. The Japanese automaker is currently facing fines at several of its U.S. plants for safety violations—including the one in Canton—and workers say the company has tried to hinder their attempts to join the United Automobile Workers union (it doesn’t help that Mississippi is a right-to-work state, meaning the law gives workers the option not to join a union, or allows them not to pay union dues if they do). And because 80 percent of the plant’s employees are African American, protesters argue that not only is it a fairness and safety issue—the plant’s difficult relationship with its workers is a civil rights one.

“I’ve had a long history with the UAW, particularly in my home state of Ohio,” Turner recently told Glamour. “In places like Ohio [and 27 other states, including Mississippi], these antiworker’s rights bills were filed back in 2011. It was a really big deal in Ohio and motivated me to cement my relationship—or ’street cred,’ if you will—with the labor community in my stance to protect their right to collectively bargain.”

There is a trend now in dissuading people from unionizing, and more right-to-work policies, like those in Ohio and Wisconsin, are being passed at the state level. What do you think this implicates for workers across the country?
It’s a dangerous trend. Workers’ wages are not keeping up with inflation. Their wages are not on pace with the amount of work that they do. We work harder and longer in this country, and still people’s wages are not keeping up with that. Labor unions have a long history of benefitting all workers, even those who are not members of unions, because everyone’s wages go up. If we don’t increase membership—and membership in labor unions is going down because of the attacks against organized labor—it’s something every single American, whether they’re officially in a union or not, should be concerned about. It’s a spiral. It’s a weakening of the middle class, and our economy can’t sustain that.

For the workers and their families, being able to bring home a living wage helps their families and, by extension, helps our economy. Seventy percent of our economy is consumer-based. We know that when lower- and middle-class families have money and disposable income, they spend it. That puts money back into the economy. It’s a win-win for everybody: not just for the individual, not just production at a specific company (like Nissan), but for the greater good. I look at what’s happening at plants like Nissan and what is happening across the country at the hands of some of my Republican sisters and brothers, and it becomes a moral question. Are we the type of country that will make progress and move forward, or are we going to go backward—and take middle- and working-class families with us? The one percent and the 10 percent are doing just fine, but the people who are bearing the brunt of this economy are the ones who suffer.

For women who are in these kinds of jobs, there is also the added factor of covering child care. What kind of effect do these working conditions have on them?
If a mother or a caregiver does not have a job that pays a living wage and they cannot afford child care, that is unacceptable. I’ve talked to my constituents over the years, and child care can almost bankrupt a family, even a two-parent household in which both parents are working. That keeps a parent from being at ease, and it really stifles the social and economic growth of a family. Women are hit hard across the board, but particularly in homes where the mother is the head of the household and the only wage earner. It hurts her, and it hurts her children. I’m always amazed to hear my more conservative colleagues talking about how they care about life. They’re pro-life, but when it comes down to safe work environments that allow for unions, being able to pay for child care, having family leave—they don’t care about any of that. That’s where I argue that they’re not pro-life; they’re pro-birth.

There’s a lot of grassroots activism happening across the country. Do you see a connection between these actions, Saturday’s Nissan rally, and what you and Senator Sanders are doing with Our Revolution?
I absolutely do. People are awake. That hashtag #staywoke is real, and I hope it continues. My hope for this country and the activists is that they never, ever go back to sleep, and they keep fighting for social justice, equality, and decency. It reminds me a lot of President Franklin Roosevelt’s Four Freedoms. Being a progressive himself, he was talking about the fact that we should provide jobs for everyone who wants one. People do have a right to live in decent housing. They do have a right to education. FDR was preaching this gospel in the thirties, and Dr. Martin Luther King did the same thing in the 1960s with the Poor People’s March on Washington. Folks in this country have these rights, and it’s the job of this country to answer this call. We need groups like the Women’s March reminding elected officials that they have a responsibility to create pathways of opportunity, and if—and when—they aren’t doing that, everyday people are going to put a little “extra” on their ordinary and extraordinary things will happen. At this moment the not-so-quiet voices rumbling across the country and the world are saying we absolutely and unequivocally deserve better.

Another point I want to make is that it’s important for women to understand that it’s bad enough that we don’t make dollar-for-dollar what men do, but when you distill that down to women of color, our Latinas and our African American women, it’s even less than that 78 cents. When you have mega-corporations that have record profits, but they don’t want to share even a little bit of that with their workers, we are actually putting our communities at peril. What happens to women happens to the entire nation. People work hard. But when you’re working long hours, you don’t get to spend time with your kids, you don’t get a chance to take a vacation every now and then, you don’t get a chance to make a big purchase (which helps the economy). There’s something wrong with that. This isn’t about wages; this about quality of life. If workers are overworked, or—like at this Nissan plant—companies hire temps at low wages, this fundamentally comes down to the quality of life for a person. It’s bigger than wages. They should be able to spend time with their families. And if they’re single, they should be able to have fun and not spend every day of their life working 12 to 15 hours a day and never get a chance to take care of their well-being. To me, that’s part of living a good life.

On Wednesday, March 8, activists and feminist leaders are calling for women to go on strike to protest the current administration and years of policy that have kept women from being equal members of society. Will you be participating in any demonstrations?
You know, I’m not sure. I can’t say definitively if I will be there physically, but I will definitely be there in spirit. I’m glad to see people coming together like this, and we have to keep this unity going. What happens to one directly happens to all indirectly. It may be Nissan workers today, but it could be somebody else somewhere else tomorrow. We have an obligation to each other to not only push our politicians but to push companies to do right by their workers. They wouldn’t even have successful companies without their workers. They are the glue that keeps things together. How, in the twenty-first century, we have mega-corporations that have lost sight of that boggles my mind.

Glamour: Last week a new DNC chair was selected. I know you’ve been involved with the DNC at the Ohio state level. What are your thoughts on new chair Tom Perez and deputy chair Keith Ellison? How can they keep up the grassroots efforts that are going on and fulfill the hopes of more progressive Democrats?
I am a member of the DNC from Ohio, so I was there in living color this past weekend. I supported Congressman Keith Ellison, and I am disappointed he did not win. I saw forces work to malign Congressman Ellison’s credibility, and I saw a tinge of Islamophobia within my own party, which causes me great dismay. I do hope that Chairman Perez and his decision to make Congressman Ellison the deputy chair, a position that does not really exist, is real. That relationship is going to have to be real for progressives who were disheartened by the direction the DNC took in 2016 during the presidential election and the direction they see the DNC taking now. I want to be clear—I want Chairman Perez to be successful. If he is successful in making sure the DNC recaptures its integrity, that is a good thing. And by integrity, I mean making sure what happened to Bernie Sanders doesn’t happen to another candidate, where you have staffers and even the chairperson putting their thumbs on the scale for one candidate in a primary over the other. We really are going to have to answer the cries of everyday women and men who are calling out for elected leaders to do something different. They want to be treated fairly, and they need a political party who represents them. It’s shameful that the elites basically have one-and-a-half political parties. Working class men and women have zero parties—or they have half a party. That’s exactly what progressives are upset about. I hope that the DNC can take a different turn and restore the party’s integrity. I’m hopeful, but I won’t hold my breath.

There’s some movement online to recruit you to run for governor of Ohio. Would you have any interest in that—or running for any office again?
We’ll see. I’m keeping my options open at this point, but I’m very humbled by the fact that grassroots efforts are rising up all over the country but particularly in my home state of Ohio. I barely have words. To know that so many people across the state, from the rural areas to the urban areas, see something in my leadership and really believe I am someone for the people means a lot to me. That’s how I want people to see me and my public service. Even if they disagree with me, I want them to know I was authentic in my public service. I stand for all people even if it causes me political heartburn—and I’m going to do that no matter what my future holds.

With the current administration just weeks into their presidency and the Republicans in control of both chambers of Congress, what are your hopes for Our Revolution and what it can achieve over the next four years?
My hope is that we help progressives win at local and state levels of government. Democrats have lost over 1,000 seats since 2009. It’s very easy for people to get up in arms about Mr. Trump, but the fact of the matter is that the Democrats took their eye off the ball starting in 2009. I see Our Revolution as being a great champion on that state and local space, because we have to get more progressives elected to those levels of government. Though we don’t control the Congress or the presidency, and we are certainly outnumbered on the state level, there is a chance for us starting this year, and in 2018, to win back some of those state seats. There are states that have started initiatives to do away with Citizen’s United. The overflow of big money in politics drowns out the voices of everyday people. That is part of the conundrum in this country: The more money you have the more speech you have. That leaves everyday people out of the equation. I also see local areas trying to push for universal health care and a single payer system. I’m so inspired by states that do that, and that’s where Our Revolution can do its greatest work—to support those people who wouldn’t normally have the support of establishment types to run and help them win.

In terms of President Trump, I really do hope that he does accomplish some of the things he said on the campaign trail. If he is willing to make investments in infrastructure, but not on the backs of the middle class and the working class, and put people back to work, that would be a good thing. If he’s serious about making Obamacare better, and not pulling the rug out from 20 million Americans who benefit from it, that would be a good thing too. I would love to see more investment to help our veterans. He’s talking about investing in the military—I imagine he wants to invest on the war side, but what we really need is to take care of our veterans, and invest in the VA hospitals, provide better mental health treatment, and help them find housing. That is a stain on America for all of us—Republican and Democrat. No administration in recent times has been able to tackle the needs of our veterans. On that, I do want to see him successful. But in terms of his travel ban and immigration policy, I don’t want to see him successful.

That is why we need this rising. We need people to fight back. So many people are depressed, and they’ve become preoccupied with the negatives of this presidency. That can cripple people mentally. We’ve had to overcome a lot in this country to become a nation of progress. We still have a lot of progress to be made. My role is to remind people that everyday people can make a difference. And if we get people out there doing things to make this country a better place, we can bring change. Decide what your role is going to be, whether it’s helping a candidate, fighting for an issue, or running for office yourself. We have the power to overcome these challenges and keep moving as a nation—and Mr. Trump does not control that.

This interview has been edited and condensed.

Watch Bill McKibben Talk Climate Change Battle On Real Time

Posted on March 3, 2017

On a particularly bad day for Earth’s wellbeing – the EPA revealed massive budgetary cuts while the Trump administration waffled on the Paris Agreement on climate change – environmentalist and 350.org founder Bill McKibben appeared on Real Time With Bill Maher to discuss the dire situation and how the American people can fight back.

“The level of complete corruption from the fossil fuel industry that marks this administration is like nothing we’ve ever seen,” McKibben said, adding that new EPA chief Scott Pruitt frequently sued the EPA on behalf of energy companies while Attorney General of Oklahoma.

“Earlier this afternoon, the EPA under Mr. Pruitt… their budget cuts leaked out. Not only are they going to cut by 97 percent the amount of money they’re spending to try and improve water quality in the Great Lakes – which finally begun to improve, same thing with San Francisco Bay, Puget Sound, Chesapeake Bay; good thing that no one lives in any of these places,” McKibben said.

“They also said they’re going to drastically cut the amount of money they spend on something called water quality compliance, the kind of things that helped alert us to things like Flint, the water crisis there. Of course, since they’re zeroing out the environmental justice program at EPA, that probably won’t be a big worry anymore.”

After pointing out that the Keystone Pipeline would be built using Russian steel – the oligarch of that Russian steel mill gifted Vladimir Putin a $35 million yacht, McKibben noted – McKibben attacked the argument that state governments will handle the things the EPA doesn’t by highlighting the crisis in Pruitt’s own state of Oklahoma.

“For as long as this continent has been around, Oklahoma has been seismically inert, as stable as it was possible to be,” McKibben said. “Now, it shakes a lot more than Oklahoma. It’s the most seismically active place on the continent because we’ve done nothing but frack it for the last 10 years and force all this water underground into wells on the faults.”

Even as the nation is divided into two halves – liberals who believe in climate change and conservatives who turn a blind eye toward it – McKibben warned, “In the end, these are not political questions. In the end, physics doesn’t care what your skin is. It just does what it does.”

NAFTA’s Legacy: Expanding Corporate Power To Attack Public Interests Laws And Outsource Jobs

Posted on February 28, 2017

At the heart of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) is a stunning corporate power grab: NAFTA grants rights to thousands of multinational corporations to bypass domestic courts and directly “sue” the U.S., Canadian and Mexican governments before a panel of three corporate lawyers.

These lawyers can award the corporations unlimited sums to be paid by taxpayers, including for the loss of expected future profits. These corporations need only convince the lawyers that a domestic law, safety regulation or court ruling – that we rely on for a clean environment, essential services and healthy communities – violates the new rights and privileges NAFTA grants to them. The corporate lawyers’ decisions are not subject to outside appeal.

How could multinational corporations attack domestic health, environmental and financial protections on which we all rely and that local companies have to follow?

NAFTA and other corporate-rigged deals include terms formally known as Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS). ISDS gives multinational corporations stunning powers, including the ability to challenge new policies – from Wall Street regulations to climate change protections – if corporations claim these policies violate their NAFTA rights and frustrate the corporations’ “expectations” of how they should be treated.

If an ISDS tribunal of three corporate lawyers rules against a challenged policy, there is no limit to the amount of taxpayer money a government can be ordered to pay a corporation. The amount is based on the “expected future profits” the tribunal surmises that the firm would have earned in the absence of the policy it is attacking. The number of ISDS attacks launched each year has exploded in recent years and the variety of policies being attacked is expanding.

Conflicts of Interest

NAFTA allows the lawyers on these tribunals to rotate between serving as “judges” and bringing cases for corporations against governments – a conflict of interest that would be forbidden as highly unethical under most legal systems. These “tribunalists,” as the three private sector attorneys are formally called, are not bound by precedent or the opinions of governments about what an agreement means. And there is no outside appeal to their rulings. If governments do not pay, the corporations can seize government property or assets directly to make up the ordered amount.

If that were not sufficiently outrageous, these special protections for multinational corporations also incentivize job offshoring. These corporate rights and powers eliminate many of the usual costs and risks that make firms think twice about moving to low-wage countries, literally incentivizing corporations to launch a new wave of job offshoring.

While this shadow legal system for multinational corporations has been around since the 1950s, just 50 known cases were launched in the regime’s first three decades combined. In contrast, corporations have launched approximately 50 claims in each of the last six years. ISDS is now so controversial that some governments have begun terminating their treaties that include ISDS.

NAFTA Cases Target Health and Environmental Policies

More than $392 million in compensation has already been paid out to corporations in a series of investor-state cases under NAFTA. This includes attacks on oil, gas, water and timber policies, toxics bans, health and safety measures, and more. In fact, of the 11 claims (for more than $36 billion) currently pending under NAFTA, nearly all relate to environmental, energy, financial, public health, land use and transportation policies – not traditional trade issues.

Here are just some examples of the overreach of the ISDS system under NAFTA.

The Investor Wins Taxpayer Compensation via Tribunal Order

Bilcon v. Canada: A NAFTA ISDS tribunal ruled in favor of a company that planned to blast a basalt quarry and marine terminal in an environmentally-sensitive area in Nova Scotia, deciding that the impact assessment that had been ordered by Canada’s Department of Fisheries and Oceans was a violation of the company’s NAFTA rights. A dissenting tribunalist called the decision “a remarkable step backwards in environmental protection.” But the Canadian government was ordered to pay more than $100 million to the firm.

Mobil / Murphy Oil v. Canada: A NAFTA ISDS tribunal ruled in favor of U.S. oil corporations Mobil (of ExxonMobil) and Murphy Oil, deeming a Canadian province’s requirement that any firm—domestic or foreign— obtaining a drilling license must contribute a small share of oil revenue to fund research and development in Newfoundland and Labrador – one of Canada’s poorest provinces. The tribunal ruled this was a NAFTA-barred performance requirement and ordered the Canadian government to pay the firms $19 million.

Metalclad v. Mexico: A Mexican municipality’s refusal to grant U.S. firm Metalclad a construction permit, which it had also denied to the contaminated facility’s previous Mexican owner (until and unless the site was cleaned up), resulted in $15.6 million in compensation being paid by Mexico to the firm after one of NAFTA’s first ISDS rulings.

S.D. Myers v. Canada: A NAFTA ISDS tribunal ordered Canadian taxpayers to pay $5.6 million for a temporary Canadian ban on the export of a hazardous waste called polychlorinated biphenyls (PCB). Though the ban complied with a multilateral environmental treaty encouraging domestic treatment of toxic waste, the tribunal deemed it to be discriminatory and a violation of the corporation’s NAFTA right to a “minimum standard of treatment.”

The Investor Extracts Payment Through a Settlement

Ethyl v. Canada: The U.S. Ethyl Corporation used NAFTA’s investor-state system in the late 1990s to reverse a Canadian environmental ban of the carcinogenic gasoline additive MMT, also banned by numerous U.S. states, while also obtaining $13 million in compensation from the Canadian government to pay for revenue lost during the ban. Canada also was required to post advertisements in newspapers claiming the chemical was safe.

AbitibiBowater v. Canada: AbitibiBowater, a paper corporation, extracted a $123 million ISDS settlement after challenging the decision of Newfoundland and Labrador, a Canadian province, to take back various timber and water rights held by AbitibiBowater after the corporation closed a paper mill. The provincial government argued that under the terms of an agreement the firm had made with the province, which was working to save the mill that employed 800 people in a rural area, AbitibiBowater’s control of the forest lands and water rights were contingent on the company’s continued operation of the paper mill.

Pending Cases With Health and Environmental Implications

TransCanada v. United States: In June 2016, the TransCanada Corporation launched a NAFTA ISDS claim demanding $15 billion in compensation because the Canadian corporation’s bid to build a pipeline was rejected by the U.S. government. The company said it had invested $3 billion, but demanded the larger sum to pay for the future expected profits it would lose if the pipeline was not allowed to operate. The U.S. government decision not to approve the pipeline, because it was not in the national interest and would exacerbate climate change, came after years of government studies. Tens of thousands of citizens in the states that would be affected and environmental activists nationwide had worked for years to demonstrate that the pipeline would pose serious health and environmental risks. Even after President Trump announced he would reverse the Obama administration decision and allow the pipeline to proceed, TransCanada is proceeding with its ISDS case. Under NAFTA rules, it could be compensated for lost revenues and costs that resulted from a delay in the pipeline’s completion.

Lone Pine v. Canada In September 2013, Lone Pine Resources, a U.S.-based oil and gas exploration and production company, launched a $109 million NAFTA ISDS claim against Canada under NAFTA to challenge Quebec’s suspension of oil and gas exploration permits for deposits under the St. Lawrence River. The decision was part of a wider moratorium on the controversial practice of hydraulic fracturing, or fracking. The provincial government had declared a moratorium in 2011 so as to conduct an environmental impact assessment of the extraction method widely known for leaching chemicals and gases into groundwater and the air.

Eli Lilly v. Canada In September 2013, U.S. pharmaceutical giant Eli Lilly and Company, launched a $483 million NAFTA ISDS challenge after Canadian courts invalidated the firm’s patents for Strattera and Zyprexa, drugs used to treat attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. In a case that greatly expands the scope of ISDS attacks, the firm is challenging Canada’s standard for issuing patents. Canadian federal courts ruled that Eli Lilly failed to meet the standards required to obtain a patent under Canadian law. Namely, the firm had failed to demonstrate or soundly predict that the drugs would provide the benefits that the firm promised when applying for the patents’ monopoly protection rights. The court’s decision paved the way for generic drug producers to make less expensive versions of the drugs. Eli Lilly is asking a NAFTA ISDS tribunal to second-guess not only the courts’ decisions, but Canada’s entire standard for issuing patents and determining their ongoing validity.

NAFTA ISDS Attacks Force Costly Defense of U.S. Policies

The U.S. government has spent tens of millions in legal costs to defend against NAFTA investor-state cases. But, thanks in part to technical errors by lawyers representing corporations in several cases, the United States has thus far dodged the bullet and avoided paying compensation. There have been 14 ISDS cases against U.S. policies–all by Canadian firms under NAFTA. A Columbia University Law School study shows that we have only narrowly escaped liability in some of these cases. For example, in the Loewen case, a NAFTA tribunal concluded that a Mississippi state Supreme Court decision that a Canadian funeral home conglomerate must follow normal civil procedure rules and post bond to appeal a contract dispute it had lost with a U.S. firm, violated NAFTA investor protections. Luckily for U.S. taxpayers, before compensation was ordered, the Canadian firm’s lawyers reincorporated the firm as a U.S. corporation under bankruptcy protection. This eliminated Loewen’s status (and privileges) as a foreign investor.

When U.S. state laws are challenged under the investor-state system, state governments have no standing and must rely on the federal government to defend their laws. If states are invited by federal officials to participate, they must pay their own legal expenses. California has incurred millions of dollars in legal costs helping to defend two state environmental laws – a toxics ban and a mining reclamation policy – that were challenged under NAFTA.

As corporations and law firms become emboldened and more creative, it is likely only a matter of time before U.S. taxpayers are on the hook, given that as long as NAFTA is in effect, more than 8,500 corporate subsidiaries from Canada and Mexico are empowered to use ISDS to challenge our policies.

The Solutions Project

Posted on February 28, 2017

The Solutions Project has mapped out a course by which the United States and the world could be powered by 80% renewable energy in the year 2030 and 100% renewable by the year 2050. Their graphic displaying this movement is included below.

Healthcare Polling Data

Posted on February 15, 2017

Opinions of the Affordable Care Act (also known as Obamacare) have fluctuated since it was first signed into law in 2010.

It has been the topic of many high-profile court cases and was a key issue in the 2016 Presidential campaign. For the most part, at least a plurality of the American public has disapproved of the ACA since its passage into law. The two outliers are during 2012, which coincides with the 2012 presidential election, and right now. In fact, more Americans approve of the ACA right now (54%) than they ever have.

When asked what they would like Congress to do with the law, almost six in ten (58%) Americans want to either keep the law as it is (7%) or keep the law and improve it (51%). In contrast, four in ten (39%) Americans would like to either repeal and replace the law (31%) or repeal with no replacement (8%).

Ultimately, over half (56%) of Americans are satisfied with the cost they pay for insurance. However, the type of insurance is a strong determinant of satisfaction – seven in ten (69%) of individuals on the government programs Medicare and Medicade are satisfied with the cost they pay for insurance, while half (52%) those on private insurance are satisfied and only three in ten (31%) of those without insurance are satisfied.

Opininons about whether healthcare coverage is the government responsibility have fluctuated over the years: from 2000 to 2008, a majority of Americans believed that healthcare coverage is the government’s responsibility. Between 2009 and 2016 opinions fluctuated. However, since 2016 there has been a sharp spike in the number of individuals who think it is the government’s responsibility (60% currently).

When asked to elaborate about how the government should or should not provide health care coverage, Americans are divided. When looking at those who said that healthcare coverage is the government’s responsibility, Americans are divided half and half. 28% of Americans think that the government should provide healthcare through a single payer system while 29% think that the government should provide healthcare through a mix of private insurance companies and government programs. In contrast, when we look at those who think that it is not the government’s responsibility to provide health care (38%), most want to maintain current programs like Medicaid and Medicare (32% of Americans). In fact, only 5% of Americans would think that the government should not be responsible for healthcare at all.

Why Millenials Will Reject Trump

Posted on February 2, 2017

In the US, pundits remain fixated on traditional party divides, and not on the deeper demographic changes that are underway. Today’s millennial generation, with its members’ future-oriented perspective, will soon dominate American politics, and the country will become increasingly liberal and economically just as a result.

The key political divide in the United States is not between parties or states; it is between generations. The millennial generation (those aged 18-35) voted heavily against Donald Trump and will form the backbone of resistance to his policies. Older Americans are divided, but Trump’s base lies among those above the age of 45. On issue after issue, younger voters will reject Trump, viewing him as a politician of the past, not the future.

Of course, these are averages, not absolutes. Yet the numbers confirm the generational divide. According to exit polls, Trump received 53% of the votes of those 45 and older, 42% of those 30-44, and just 37% of voters 18-29. In a 2014 survey, 31% of millennials identified as liberals, compared with 21% of baby boomers (aged 50-68 in the survey) and only 18% of the silent generation (69 and above).

The point is not that today’s young liberals will become tomorrow’s older conservatives. The millennial generation is far more liberal than the baby boomers and silent generation were in their younger years. They are also decidedly less partisan, and will support politicians who address their values and needs, including third-party aspirants.

There are at least three big differences in the politics of the young and old. First, the young are more socially liberal than the older generations. For them, America’s growing racial, religious, and sexual plurality is no big deal. A diverse society of whites, African-Americans, Hispanics, and Asians, and of the native-born and immigrants, is the country they’ve always known, not some dramatic change from the past. They accept sexual and gender categories – lesbian, gay, trans, bi, inter, pan, and others – that were essentially taboo for – or unknown to – their grandparents’ (Trump’s) generation.

Second, the young are facing the unprecedented economic challenges of the information revolution. They are entering the labor market at a time when market returns are rapidly shifting toward capital (robots, artificial intelligence, and smart machines generally) and away from labor. The elderly rich, by contrast, are enjoying a stock market boom caused by the same technological revolution.

Trump is peddling cuts in corporate taxes and estate taxes that would further benefit the elderly rich (who are amply represented in Trump’s cabinet), at the expense of larger budget deficits that further burden the young. Indeed, the young need the opposite policy: higher taxes on the wealth of the older generation in order to finance post-secondary education, job training, renewable-energy infrastructure, and other investments in America’s future.

Third, compared to their parents and grandparents, the young are much more aware of climate change and its threats. While Trump is enticing the older generation with one last fling with fossil fuels, the young will have none of it. They want clean energy and will fight against the destruction of the Earth that they and their own children will inherit.

Part of the generational divide over global warming is due to the sheer ignorance of many older Americans, including Trump, about climate change and its causes. Older Americans didn’t learn about climate change in school. They were never introduced to the basic science of greenhouse gases. That is why they are ready to put their own short-term financial interests ahead of the dire threats to their grandchildren’s generation.

In a June 2015 survey, 60% of 18-29 year-olds said that human activity was causing global warming, compared with just 31% of those 65 and older. A survey released in January found that 38% of American survey respondents 65 and older favored fossil-fuel expansion over renewable energy, compared with only 19% of those 18-29.

Trump’s economic policies are geared to this older, whiter, native-born America. He favors tax cuts for the older rich, which would burden the young with higher debt. He is indifferent to the $1 trillion overhang of student debt. He is reprising the 1990s NAFTA debate over free trade, rather than facing the far more important twenty-first-century jobs challenge posed by robotics and artificial intelligence. And he is obsessed with squeezing a few more years of profit out of America’s coal, oil, and gas reserves at the cost of a future environmental catastrophe.

One might attribute Trump’s backward-looking mindset to his age. At 70, Trump is the oldest person ever to become president (Ronald Reagan was slightly younger when he took office in 1981). Yet age is hardly the sole or even the main factor here. Bernie Sanders, certainly the freshest mind of all the 2016 presidential candidates and the hero of millennial voters, is 75. The young are enchanted with Pope Francis, 80, because he puts their concerns – whether about poverty, employment difficulties, or vulnerability to global warming – within a moral framework, rather than dismissing them with the crass cynicism of Trump and his ilk.

The main issue here is mindset and political orientation, not chronological age. Trump has the shortest time horizon (and attention span) of any president in historical memory. And he is utterly out of touch with the real challenges facing the young generation as they grapple with new technologies, shifting labor markets, and crushing student debt. A trade war with Mexico and China, or a tragically misconceived ban on Muslim migrants, will hardly meet their real needs.

Trump’s political success is a blip, not a turning point. Today’s millennials, with their future-oriented perspective, will soon dominate American politics. America will be multiethnic, socially liberal, climate conscious, and much fairer in sharing the economic benefits of new technology.

Too many observers remain fixated on the traditional party divides in the US Congress, not on the deeper demographic changes that will soon be decisive. Sanders nearly captured the Democratic nomination (and would likely have triumphed in the general election) with a platform appealing powerfully to the millennials. Their time is coming, most likely with a president they support in 2020.