Higher taxes, please

By The Economist | WASHINGTON

MATTHEW YGLESIAS makes the case for higher taxes on the middle class, the only possible way to pay for the welfare state that Democrats not-so-secretly want to create. "If you care about inequality," he argues, then

the thing to focus on is not soaking the rich through the tax code but rather ensuring that there's enough tax revenue to finance generous public services. Broad social-insurance schemes like Social Security and unemployment insurance, as well as government operations more generally, are strongly progressive in their impact.

This is what honest liberals say, or used to say. But it's been a casualty of the conservative movement's rise. The Republican Party is at a low ebb, but unfortunately for Mr Yglesias there's still no enthusiasm for a "more sacrifice is good for all of us" argument. The 1994 elections, the defeat of George Bush, the (okay, asterisked) defeat of Al Gore in an election that pitted tax cuts against more social spending—all of that convinced Democrats that they can't win on middle-class tax increases.

The problem is that Democrats can't convince the country that enough is at risk to hand over more control, and more money, to the government. If most of the middle class feared the loss of health-care coverage, they'd likely think it worth paying higher taxes to guarantee it. After all, the elderly worry about their financial safety, and they have no problem with the cost of their safety net. But things aren't quite bad enough for the changes that Mr Yglesias desires.