New deal Quote by Ian Haney López
““Start with the first half of Phillips’ statement, the claim that economic issues favored the Democrats when government programs “taxed the few for the many.” This represents 1964, when Goldwater assailed the New Deal and lost in a landslide. To this point, liberalism still comprised programs primarily geared toward helping whites. Thus, the “many” were the white middle-class beneficiaries of government programs, and the “few” were the rich who were asked to pay more in taxes. But then Phillips flipped the order, and argued that Democrats began to lose when they began promoting “‘welfare’ that taxed the many for the few.” Here he was talking about the Johnson administration’s effort to extend government aid across the color line, and the white hostility that””
About This Quote
Source Article: The New York Times, “The Politics of Taxation,” 2023
The argument flips the narrative that tax policy harms the many, showing it can also protect them from elite exploitation.
In simple terms: Tax policy can protect the many from the few.
Key Takeaway
Consider who truly benefits from tax changes.
Themes
politics
economics
taxation
race
policy
history
Mood
critical
thoughtful
Type
analytical
political
When to use this quote
- policy debates
- voting decisions
- public discussions
- academic research
- community organizing
Key Concepts
distributional equity
political rhetoric
class dynamics
Questions to Reflect On
- Who truly benefits from tax reforms?
- How do race and class intersect in tax policy?
A Different Perspective
The claim may oversimplify complex socioeconomic factors.
![“The crisis [the Great Depression] discovered a great man in Franklin Roosevelt...None too soon he has carried America forward to the second stage of democratic realization. His New Deal involves such collective controls of the national business that it would be absurd to call it anything but…” quote by H. G. Wells](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/772/h-g-wells-1122_absurd_the-crisis-the-great-depression-discover_120950.jpg)
