Our culture's Judeo-Christian tradition offers powerful counsel on this subject, words that we should not be afraid to wield. The biblical book of Proverbs, for example, warns that "the borrower is servant to the lender," and Psalms 37:21 offers the more pointed injunction that "the wicked borrow and don't pay back."
How does all this apply to policy choices? In countless ways. Leaders should speak the language of moral indignation to push a real reform agenda: increasing the Social Security eligibility age, indexing benefits to price (not wage) inflation and establishing carve-out personal retirement accounts because these are the right things to do for our kids. Speak of sacrifice (whose Latin root means "sacred") for future generations when advocating taxes on those most able to pay; raising the Social Security payroll tax cap, the Medicare Part A tax rate and Medicare Part B premiums; and introducing consumption, carbon and higher gas taxes. Evoke the prophetic tradition in explaining the need for practical reforms such as slashing corporate welfare, imposing stricter budget rules and gradually moving from the current Medicare model of paying for health care for the elderly to a system, like Massachusetts', of universal health insurance that is mandated and publicly subsidized for those with the greatest economic need.
