a friend tweeted this week that she doesn't understand why people fail to vote in their self-interest. i don't, either.
except, maybe i do.
first of all, let's get it straight, right from the get-go, that i am not advocating that we go out there and be masochists. life has plenty of pain and strife without us running around creating it. that's A.
B is, your own self-interest shouldn't be the holiest thing. mattera fact, it oughta be pretty low on the list.
that said, i doubt that most people who vote against their self-interest do it because their intent is to be holy. they probably do it because they don't understand what they're doing. but i would like to submit that what would be glorious is for someone to know that what they are voting for is not in their self-interest but they do it anyway. because they don't think that their self-interest is the number one thing. maybe there are at least a handful of people out there who vote for somebody else's self-interest because, well.......it's the right thing to do! even if it does cause you some personal pain. especially if it causes you some personal pain!
i think of all the people through the years who (whom? i never know) i have heard say that because they don't have children, they don't vote for school levies. that's self-interest for ya.
i'm hardly an economist and i don't know where i stand on the minimum wage debate, but i know this much - minimum wage isn't about the person who pays it. it's about the person who receives it. i understand that there are a lot of variables to take into consideration where minimum wage is concerned - there always are when we're talkin' money - but if a smart economist can prove that raising the minimum wage hurts the minimum wage earner, then we ought not to raise it. and if a smart economist can prove that raising the minimum wage helps the minimum wage earner (without devastating - just, perhaps, hurting a little - the minimum wage payer) then we ought to raise it.
(but i don't know if we should raise it or not. because i'm not an economist. hell, i can barely add.)
my point is this - why does everything have to be done in our own self-interest? i think that's banal.
let's rise.
