Angry monkeys

Today’s post is written by guest blogger Linda Christman.

Bret Stephens, a conservative columnist for the New York Times, recently wrote that once people got a small tax cut, they wouldn’t care that the bulk of the benefits would go to corporations and the richest Americans.

I disagree.  I recall an experiment where two monkeys were given the same reward of one banana for doing a simple task.  After a time, the reward for one monkey was doubled while the other continued to get one banana.  You would think that the short-changed monkey would be perfectly happy.  After all, he continued to gat a banana for his task.  He wasn’t happy.  He exhibited monkey anger and flung unpleasant things at the experimenter.  Apparently, monkeys have a sense of what is fair.  

The Republican tax bill is the same.  When taxpayers compare their tax cut to those granted to the wealthy, they will be angry.

Even a monkey could see that.