Stealing the Future from our Kids

This week marked the 1-year anniversary of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act–the stimulus bill that pumped $787 billion into the U.S. Economy to avert financial catastrophe and a 2nd Great Depression. We can debate all day about could have, should have, would haves with the benefit of 20/20 hindsight, but I do believe, on balance, the actions taken by the administration over the past year probably did avert disaster. But…

Today I saw this quote from Governor Patrick:

“When you talk about what you do for your son, that’s what this is all about.”

Governor Deval Patrick, to Derek Lilly, a father of five, who had been describing what it feels like to be a role model for his son now that he has a job thanks to a Stimulus-funded job development program at Boston ABCD.

How can anyone defend the bailout of greedy bankers and free market enthusiasts as something we did for our kids? We did it because the cost of all other alternatives was far worse. We borrowed the future of the next generation to pay off the failures of the present and ensure that angry mobs of unemployed people didn’t burn down the Capital.

What does the future look like? I believe the next generation will find a way. As someone who is in Generation X, in my early 40s, I worry not so much that people like me and younger will simply suffer under the burden of higher taxes, long-term high unemployment rates, and increasingly diminished opportunities that result from paying off or not paying off this huge debt…I worry about what future bad choices we’ll be asked to make.

We are setting the stage for a generational war to replace the so-called cultural war. Instead of Red and Blue states, we will have Green and Gray states. We will see policy choices that increasingly “pay back” the current leadership generation for their abdication of stewardship. We will see a world where policy makers don’t have any sympathy for the “lazy” 70-year old who wants to retire or expects to receive a pension. Out of necessity, younger people will take charge of this mess they have inherited with solutions from their own perspective that is shaped by this world that is unfolding over the next decade.

I’m not saying young people are or will be heartless or seek to actively punish anyone. But the world of choices we are shaping will force harder and harder decisions that will hurt those who do not seek and maintain power.

There is already anger in this country and there should be more. We averted disaster. Great. But don’t tell me this benefits my kids. Tell me what we are going to do to ensure a future worthy of our stewardship. Tell me what sacrifices we are going to make now and then have the guts to lead on those issues.