A Gentleman’s view.

Money and Morals By PAUL KRUGMAN

Lately inequality has re-entered the national conversation. Occupy Wall Street gave the issue visibility, while the Congressional Budget Office supplied hard data on the widening income gap. And the myth of a classless society has been exposed: Among rich countries, America stands out as the place where economic and social status is most likely to be inherited.

So you knew what was going to happen next. Suddenly, conservatives are telling us that it’s not really about money; it’s about morals. Never mind wage stagnation and all that, the real problem is the collapse of working-class family values, which is somehow the fault of liberals.

But is it really all about morals? No, it’s mainly about money.

To be fair, the new book at the heart of the conservative pushback, Charles Murray’s “Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010,” does highlight some striking trends. Among white Americans with a high school education or less, marriage rates and male labor force participation are down, while births out of wedlock are up. Clearly, white working-class society has changed in ways that don’t sound good.

But the first question one should ask is: Are things really that bad on the values front?

Mr. Murray and other conservatives often seem to assume that the decline of the traditional family has terrible implications for society as a whole. This is, of course, a longstanding position. Reading Mr. Murray, I found myself thinking about an earlier diatribe, Gertrude Himmelfarb’s 1996 book, “The De-Moralization of Society: From Victorian Virtues to Modern Values,” which covered much of the same ground, claimed that our society was unraveling and predicted further unraveling as the Victorian virtues continued to erode.

Yet the truth is that some indicators of social dysfunction have improved dramatically even as traditional families continue to lose ground. As far as I can tell, Mr. Murray never mentions either the plunge in teenage pregnancies among all racial groups since 1990 or the 60 percent decline in violent crime since the mid-90s. Could it be that traditional families aren’t as crucial to social cohesion as advertised?

Still, something is clearly happening to the traditional working-class family. The question is what. And it is, frankly, amazing how quickly and blithely conservatives dismiss the seemingly obvious answer: A drastic reduction in the work opportunities available to less-educated men.

Most of the numbers you see about income trends in America focus on households rather than individuals, which makes sense for some purposes. But when you see a modest rise in incomes for the lower tiers of the income distribution, you have to realize that all — yes, all — of this rise comes from the women, both because more women are in the paid labor force and because women’s wages aren’t as much below male wages as they used to be.

For lower-education working men, however, it has been all negative. Adjusted for inflation, entry-level wages of male high school graduates have fallen 23 percent since 1973. Meanwhile, employment benefits have collapsed. In 1980, 65 percent of recent high-school graduates working in the private sector had health benefits, but, by 2009, that was down to 29 percent.

So we have become a society in which less-educated men have great difficulty finding jobs with decent wages and good benefits. Yet somehow we’re supposed to be surprised that such men have become less likely to participate in the work force or get married, and conclude that there must have been some mysterious moral collapse caused by snooty liberals. And Mr. Murray also tells us that working-class marriages, when they do happen, have become less happy; strange to say, money problems will do that.

One more thought: The real winner in this controversy is the distinguished sociologist William Julius Wilson.

Back in 1996, the same year Ms. Himmelfarb was lamenting our moral collapse, Mr. Wilson published “When Work Disappears: The New World of the Urban Poor,” in which he argued that much of the social disruption among African-Americans popularly attributed to collapsing values was actually caused by a lack of blue-collar jobs in urban areas. If he was right, you would expect something similar to happen if another social group — say, working-class whites — experienced a comparable loss of economic opportunity. And so it has.

So we should reject the attempt to divert the national conversation away from soaring inequality toward the alleged moral failings of those Americans being left behind. Traditional values aren’t as crucial as social conservatives would have you believe — and, in any case, the social changes taking place in America’s working class are overwhelmingly the consequence of sharply rising inequality, not its cause.

Jeremy Lin, Knicks Top Lakers: Kobe Bryant Can’t Match Surprise New York Star By BRIAN MAHONEY

Jeremy Lin does it again!

NEW YORK — Jeremy Lin keeps getting better. Better even than Kobe Bryant on Friday night.

Lin had the most astounding performance of his remarkable week, scoring a career-high 38 points and outdueling Bryant as the New York Knicks held off the Los Angeles Lakers 92-85.

Buried deep on the bench a little more than a week ago, Lin led the Knicks to their fourth straight win, tying their longest streak of the season. His two free throws with 52 seconds left and some booming “MVP! MVP!” chants stopped the Lakers’ final rally and allowed the undrafted Harvard product to pass Carmelo Anthony for the highest-scoring game by a Knicks player this season.

Iman Shumpert added 12 points for the Knicks, who are still without Anthony and Amare Stoudemire. But they have Lin, the point guard that two other teams gave up on in December and didn’t get his chance in New York until three other players couldn’t do the job.

Bryant finished with 34 points, but he got off to a horrendous start and finished only 11 of 29 from the field. Pau Gasol had 16 points and 10 rebounds, but All-Star Andrew Bynum was only 1 of 8 for three points with 13 rebounds as the Lakers’ nine-game winning streak against the Knicks was snapped.

Five of those wins had come at Madison Square Garden, where fans used to roar for Bryant.

They’ve got a new favorite now, and who could have ever predicted it’d be Lin?

The most surprising story in the NBA came back into the game with 9:25 left after the Knicks’ lead had been trimmed to three. Shumpert hit a jumper and blew by Bryant for a dunk before Lin knocked down a jumper to push the lead to 76-69 with about 8 minutes left.

The lead was still eight before Lin nailed a long jumper, then was wide open after an offensive rebound for a 3-pointer from the wing, making it 84-71 as fans stood and screamed throughout the Lakers’ timeout.

Lin followed his 28-point, eight-assist outing Monday in his first career start by scoring 23 points and handing out 10 assists Wednesday against Washington, becoming the first player since LeBron James in 2003 and just the sixth since 1970 to have at least 20 points and eight assists in his first two starts, according to research from the Elias Sports Bureau provided by the Knicks.

He became an instant star in New York just as fans were ready to check out basketball after the Giants’ Super Bowl run was over, and just when it appeared the Knicks might fall too far behind in the standings to salvage the season.

Some Lin shirts were scattered throughout Madison Square Garden – though Spike Lee was still wearing Landry Fields’ No. 2 in his courtside seat. Ratings on MSG network are up since Lin joined the lineup, and the NBA said some of its Asian TV partners have added Knicks games to their broadcast schedules so fans can see the league’s first American-born player of Chinese or Taiwanese descent.

Already drawing comparisons to Tim Tebow for his impact on teammates and the way he speaks of his faith afterward, the hype around him will only grow now after beating one of the league’s marquee franchises in his first nationally televised game.

A night after needing overtime to win at Boston, the Lakers had nothing to start the game, and Lin quickly jumped on them. He started 4 of 5 as the Knicks raced to a 13-4 lead, and it grew to 19-8 as Los Angeles missed 12 of its first 13 shots.

Lin’s four field goals in the first quarter matched the Lakers’ total in 18 attempts (22 percent).

The Lakers cut a 14-point deficit to five late in the half before Lin put the Knicks back in control. He had a turnaround jumper then spun around to leave Derek Fisher behind on his way to a layup, pushing it to 47-38 with 2:44 remaining. It was 49-41 at halftime.

Bryant started 1 of 11 before hitting five of his next six shots. The record holder at the current arena with 61 points, he also grabbed 10 rebounds but got going far too late.

Notes: The Knicks had two points taken off the board in the third quarter when the referees ruled a foul earlier in the period on Metta World Peace shouldn’t have counted against the Lakers’ team foul total, so the Knicks shouldn’t have been in the bonus and shot free throws yet on a later foul. … Knicks coach Mike D’Antoni said Anthony told him he was feeling better and walking without pain. The All-Star forward is expected to be re-evaluated Sunday, but D’Antoni said he doubted Anthony would play Tuesday at Toronto. The Knicks said Anthony was expected to miss a week or two after he was hurt Monday. … Stoudemire, whose brother died in Florida on Monday, is expected to rejoin the team at practice Monday. … Fisher made his 400th consecutive start. He has played in 522 straight games, the longest active streak in the league. … Celebrities on hand included actor Ben Stiller, wrestler and actor Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, and Giants Justin Tuck, Brandon Jacobs, Hakeem Nicks and Antrel Rolle.

___

5 Right-Wing Governors Gutting Schools to Fund Prisons, Tax Breaks for the Rich…And a Bible Theme Park

When state after state slashes education dollars, we see what matters to them–and where they spend while cutting schools tells us even more.

It’s budget time again, and with the economy still in rough shape, that means it’s time for governors to show where their priorities are.

It’s probably not surprising that right-wing governors claim they can’t fund education properly when revenues are low—we’ve been seeing this happen for years, even before an actual economic crisis knocked states sideways. But cutting funds to schools isn’t the only option for states even if they do have to balance their budgets. There are many other places to cut—and of course, they have the option of raising taxes, something the conservative crowd simply refuses to do.

Like any other choice made by a politician, budgeting is a decision laced with ideology. When state after state slashes education dollars (and often at the same time funnels more of the money they do spend to private companies running charter schools, or gives it away as vouchers) we see what matters to them. And when you take a look at the programs that get funded, or the people who get fat tax cuts as money is drained out of the schools, well, you see what matters to state governments.

Here’s a look at five of the governors taking money away from their states’ kids, and a look at some of the things they are still funding.

1. Pennsylvania

Governor Tom Corbett set off a wave of anger this week when his new budget hit—and slashed a full $1.2 billion from pre-kindergarten through 12th grade education. According to the Education Law Center, that’s taking a full 15 percent out of the budgets of the state’s already-struggling schools.

That would be bad enough. But, as the Law Center noted, “the cuts fall hardest on school districts with the greatest student poverty.” That means schools in poor districts will get less funding, while wealthy districts lose very little. So the Reading School District in Berks County, which has a frighting 90 percent student poverty rate, loses $1,083 per student, while the Wyomissing School District, with only 22 percent student poverty, is losing just $112 per student.

Corbett expects the schools to make up the funding cuts, naturally, by cutting teachers’ pay and firing more experienced teachers—which probably means bigger classes and more work for those who remain with lower salaries.

And then there’s the state’s universities, which already took a 20 percent hit last year. According to the Delaware County Daily Times, Corbett’s cutting $230 million from Penn State, Pitt and Temple—an “astounding” 25 percent.

Meanwhile, what doesn’t get cut in this budget? While schoolkids in poor districts will see their teachers laid off and their classes get bigger, Corbett’s pumped up funding for prisons (11 percent) probation and parole (6 percent) and state police (6 percent). Guess we know where he expects those kids to wind up.

2. Ohio

Ohio governor John Kasich should be used to protests by now—he certainly has seen enough of them since he decided to attack his state’s public workers last winter. So although candidates for the state legislature joined Occupy protesters in decrying Kasich’s budget cuts to education while eliminating the estate tax for the state’s wealthiest, it doesn’t seem to have made much of an impact.

According to Policy Matters Ohio, the state’s budget (signed this summer) takes $1.8 billion in funding away from Ohio’s elementary and secondary schools over the next two school years. The new report noted that 65 percent of respondents to its survey of Ohio school districts say they are facing budget shortfalls as a result of state budget cuts—that means pay freezes, pay cuts, not replacing teachers who retire; 45 percent report “reductions in force”–layoffs.

In his State of the State speech, Kasich touted education as a solution to the state’s struggles, but it’s hard to see how the state can educate its way out of anything when school districts keep facing cuts. (He urged universities to “commercialize” their research, which is a fancy way of saying produce things they can sell to corporations or that will entice grants from corporate America.)

If Kasich really wanted to demonstrate a commitment to education, he could change his mind about the state’s estate tax, which hit the 7 percent of wealthy Ohioans who inherit more than $338,333, and will be abolished next January. That’d save about $250 million a year that could go to the far more than 7 percent of Ohioans who make use of public schools.

3. South Carolina

Kasich’s elimination of the estate tax is certainly one example of policies that favor the 1 percent and leave students out in the cold, but South Carolina governor Nikki Haley has gone Kasich one better and proposes to entirely eliminate the corporate income tax in her state. That would cost nearly $140 million in the first year alone—so Haley’s taking a chunk of that cash out of public schools.

Her budget, according to Columbia, SC news channel WLTX , cuts “a key funding stream” for public schools, one that primarily goes to teachers’ salaries. And another local station, WJBF, reports that while Haley cut public school teachers’ incomes, she includes an extra $10 million for charter schools. So that’s less money for public employees, more money for private companies using state education funds.

John Ruoff, policy analyst and founder of South Carolina Fair Share, pointed out that eliminating the state corporate tax is likely to have little impact on job creation—but a big impact on much-needed public programs like the schools. “Governor Haley ought to be a lot more concerned about how we develop a state that businesses want to come to,” Ruoff told Tax Analysts. That means having decent infrastructure and a well-educated workforce, not just a zero tax rate.

4. Alabama

In no state is it so abundantly clear that the governor is prioritizing other spending over education than in Alabama, where Governor Robert Bentley has proposed taking $230 million from the Education Trust Fund and putting it into the General Fund, which pays for prisons, courts and other parts of the state government.

Henry Mabry of the Alabama Education Association (a teachers’ group) told the Birmingham News, “The governor’s actions are absolutely outrageous and do nothing but cut education to bail out the prison system.” And Bentley seemed to inadvertently echo Mabry when he defended his move by saying, “By doing that, we will not have to let a single prisoner out of prison.”

He also wanted to shift Medicaid costs for children’s healthcare into the education fund, an additional drain of about $185 million, and his budget for 2013 cuts 1,381 public school teachers, principals and other staffers, and takes $41.1 million from universities and $5.4 million for two-year colleges.

Bentley’s plan is so outrageous that it’s drawn condemnations from both parties in the state legislature—including the chair of a committee it would need to pass. “It’s not going to fly. It’s dead,” Rep. Jim Barton, R-Mobile, told the Birmingham News.

5. Kentucky

Just to note that it’s not just Republicans who cut education dollars and spend on ridiculous things instead—Kentucky governor Steve Beshear is a Democrat, albeit one who brags on his official Web site about “trimming the state workforce” and “reforming” child welfare. Yet his budget offered up a 6.4 percent cut to higher ed and a decrease in funds to K-12 students as well.

But that’s not the best part. Travis Waldron at ThinkProgress explained that the governor did preserve a $43 million tax break for a “Bible-themed amusement park — which will include a 500-foot by 75-foot reproduction of Noah’s Ark,” as well as $11 million in spending on the highway interchange that will be near the park.

Waldron pointed out, “…lawmakers could jeopardize Kentucky’s substantial gains in K-12 education and ensure ballooning tuition rates at its colleges and universities, all while they preserve tax breaks for what critics have dubbed the “Ark Park.”

Sarah Jaffe