""Reverse Robin Hood": Does That Mean Contrary, Or Turned Around?

Casey Mulligan had an interesting post:

"Workers at GM, Ford, and Chrysler are not among the poor by any definition: those workers' salary and benefits total more than $70 per hour!! Yes, I typed that correctly. Very few

American workers earn that much per hour.

GM, Ford, and Chrysler shareholders are not among the poor either: the poor own little if any stocks. So a GM bailout would benefit rich workers and rich shareholders. I guess the argument is that a GM bailout would trickle down to people who really are poor, or at least middle class.

Many of us hope that President-elect Obama will not tolerate trickle down nonsense. The problem in this situation is that the United Autoworkers Union was a strong and visible supporter of Obama, and the auto industry is in deep trouble NOW. Will our hopes be dashed within days of the inauguration?"

I'm not sure I understand the argument here. Is a principle like the following being put forth?

Only give government money to the poor.

If so, it seems clearly ridiculous. It might be a nice idea, but it has nothing to do with our system of government. Let's see if there's more:

"I see three reasons to continue hope.

1. First, President Obama may stand up to the UAW. Maybe he would even insist that we cannot tax the average American to bail out those who are already more fortunate than most Americans!
2. Second, GM is failing so fast that it might not last until inauguration day. Thus it might be Bush who stands up to the UAW -- he has done well on that lately. I admit that Bush's actions on this matter are not consistent with the Republicans' Reverse Robin Hood reputation, but I take solace in the fact that Secretary Paulson initiated the Wall Street bailout, even if many fellow Republicans did oppose it for a few days.
3. Third, a fast failure may result in Bush's living up to the Republican reputation by bailing out automakers before inauguration day -- not exactly Robin Hood's outcome, but at least Obama's record would be untarnished."

Robin Hood. I must be one of the few people on earth who doesn't know much about him. Years ago I was likened to Friar Tuck in a newspaper piece, and I really didn't know enough about him to tell if that was a compliment or insult. I did, however, doubt that friars were Jewish, even then. I guess it could work in the sense that Groucho Marx was roasted by the Friars Club. Maybe that was it.

Anyway, I know that he lived around the time of Richard The Lionhearted, so, I have a rough idea of the economy of the time. Analogizing to today, which, I'll keep warning everyone, analogies are deucedly tricky, I would suspect that Robin Hood would not only ask for bailout money from the government, but actually rob it. So, maybe I'm missing something here.

Let's forget about Robin Hood then, and just go back to the argument. I walk into the government lending office, and ask for a loan. Assuming I'm rich, and that's quite an assumption, I ask for a loan. He tells me no, because I'm rich. There are people poorer than you, I'm afraid. Fine. The government loan officer is a kind of a Rawlsian, saying that poorer people must get money before you do. Our money is dispersed to the person who has the least money first, and so on. We'll be a long time getting to you.

I kind of like the idea. I've already said I'm for a guaranteed income, with health care purchased with it, a la Charles Murray. Yet, even in that situation, some rich people, defense contractors, prison guards, will get paid. It's an interesting idea. Nothing to do with life on earth, but, as a devotee of modal logic, we can try it somewhere.

Now, let's approach this in our world. I enter the office. You're rich. So what? See, I pay what are called taxes, lots of them, and that gives me a claim to be heard on receiving government largess. I'm rich, but not rich enough, so you're going to have to actually hear my claim out, and judge it based on that. That's our system. I pay in, then you listen. We'll call it a Rent-Seeking, like George Will does.

And here's one other thing. My employees spend money, and that money affords a livelihood to lots of other people, not all of whom are rich. Sorry, your example was a bit misleading.

So, I might be missing something, but I don't see anything peculiar about the auto maker's claim on government given our system. Their claim might or might not be worth acting upon, but that needs an argument based on our actual governmental system. That's where real world claims are made, and, sorry to bring up Austin and Wittgenstein, but claims can only be judged in the context in which they actually occur. Otherwise, you can get yourself into some very troubling philosophical conundrums, as their work illustrates over and over. As Wittgenstein says:

"98. But if someone were to say "So logic too is an empirical science" he would be wrong. Yet this is right: the same proposition may get treated at one time as something to test by experience, at another as a rule of testing."