Democrats need better cents

Back in the 1990s, when I was an eager volunteer in my local Democratic club, my chores included distributing low-level patronage to needy families in our central Brooklyn district. Then, as now, there was a lot of need and plenty of work to do.

In the spring and summer, I signed people up to get certified as official poll site workers, which at the time paid a little over $100 for a long day’s work helping people cast ballots on Primary Day and Election Day. In the fall, right before Thanksgiving, I would distribute canned ham and frozen turkeys — donated by a local supermarket — to families on a list maintained by the party’s district leader.

I had recently earned a fancy master’s degree in political science, but being a club worker taught lessons they didn’t offer at Yale. It was especially eye-opening to see how grateful people were for what well-off folks would consider a trivial amount of money.

You wouldn’t think anybody would be ecstatic over being handed a $15 turkey, but the moms I gave them to made clear the club had made it possible to serve a holiday dinner to their family instead of an ordinary meal.

Senior citizens I connected with a poll-site job would thank me about it for years after the fact. Many had carefully budgeted how the $100 would enable them to buy Christmas gifts each year.

So I was greatly surprised — and a little disgusted — to read about a Democratic spasm of outrage when House Speaker Paul Ryan approvingly cited an Associated Press story about what some working-class families plan to do with money from the recent federal tax cut.

Ryan used a Twitter post to cite the case of a public high school secretary named Julia Ketchum, whose pay recently increased by $1.50 a week. “That adds up to $78 a year, which she said will more than cover her Costco membership for the year,” the story said.

It made perfect sense to me. Using the extra money to buy a $60 membership at the discount Costco store opens the door to a year’s worth of much lower prices on everything from diapers and baby formula to groceries, gasoline and household appliances.

By joining Costco, Ketchum can save hundreds or even thousands of dollars a year. A smart use of $78. But leading Dems went nuts. Gavin Newsom, lieutenant governor of California, weighed in with: “Guess someone told Paul Ryan you shouldn’t go around praising yourself for giving a working person an extra $1.50 a week — because he deleted this tweet.”

Rep. Nancy Pelosi, leader of the House Democrats, responded on Twitter, in part: “Paul Ryan deleted his embarrassing tweet of a blatant admission because he and Republicans don’t want you to know the truth: the #GOPTaxScam is a gift to corporate America and the top 1% at your expense.”

And Rep. Keith Ellison, deputy chairman of the Democratic National Committee, responded with: “Wells Fargo, fresh off of defrauding millions of Americans, gets $3.4 billion.”

The tone-deaf cascade of political talking points is a timely reminder of why Democrats — who should be cruising to a wave of victories this fall — could end up losing another election cycle.

Granted, there are plenty of reasons to hate the Republican tax law. It’s too skewed in favor of higher-income Americans, and in later years will starve the government of much-needed revenue, which threatens important programs like Medicare and Social Security.

But in the short term, the bill puts a significant amount of money into the hands of working-class Americans, and that is no small thing.

The nonpartisan Tax Policy Center estimates that a middle-income household will get an average tax cut of $930 this year. Where I live, that is a meaningful chunk of change. The fact that Wells Fargo, the Koch family and other high rollers are getting vastly more from the law doesn’t change the reality that some people — millions, in fact — can thank the Republicans for making their lives tangibly better in the here and now.

Democrats, instead of ridiculing an undeniably useful benefit, should try to compete with the Republican plan with programs like the Earned Income Tax Credit, which in 2016 provided an average credit of $5,572 to a family with two kids — considerably more than the GOP reduction.

And for God’s sake, drop the scornful dismissal of people trying to do more with less. You’re supposed to give away the turkeys, not act like one.