Sunny Conservatives

Arthur C. Brooks recently made waves by documenting that conservatives are more generous by far than liberals in charitable giving, in his book, "Who Really Cares: The Surprising Truth About Compassionate Conservatism". In yesterday's WSJ Brooks commented on the minimum wage debate--- liberals like to raise it, conservatives say it costs entry-level jobs. But part of the liberal argument is to even out income levels (you know, reminiscent of the old Soviet model, where everyone is equally miserable.):

And while 84% of liberals think the government should do more to reduce inequality, only 25% of conservatives agree.

This is empirical substantiation for the old cliché that conservatives just don't care about the poor, right? Wrong. In fact, the data do not tell us that conservatives are uncaring; they actually tell us that conservatives are optimists. Conservatives are relatively untroubled by inequality, and unsupportive of government income redistribution, because they believe the American economy provides private opportunities to succeed. Liberals are far more pessimistic than conservatives about the possibility of a better future for Americans of modest means.

Consider the evidence. While 92% of conservatives believe that hard work and perseverance can help a person overcome disadvantage, only 65% of liberals think so. This difference of opinion, contrary to the convention, is not because conservatives earn more money. In fact, lower-income conservatives are about twice as likely as upper-income liberals to say they think there's "a lot" of upward mobility in America. If a liberal and a conservative are exactly identical in income, education, sex, family situation, and race, the conservative will be 20 percentage points more likely than the liberal to say that hard work leads to success among the disadvantaged.

So not only are conservatives more compassionate, we are sunnier too. (You need only to look at this liberal face for illustration. ) And remember Ronald Reagan.

As a postscript, while it's a feel-good measure, the minimum wage increase will disproportionately cost minorities their first rung on the jobs ladder. It also has other unintended consequences, like raising the dropout rate among high school students, as work becomes more attractive.