Tony Perkings Is an Idiot - We Make Him Wear the ‘Bigotdunce’ Cap
On Monday’s edition of Washington Watch, Family Research Council president Tony Perkins said marriage equality and the repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell will lead to America’s economic collapse. -
As I’ve talked with General [Jerry Boykin, FRC’s vice president], the US currency being the world standard, if that’s taken away, if Russia convinces China and others to move away from the US Dollar as the international standard, here’s what happens: America is no longer able to just print money. See, no other country has been able to do what we have done in terms of $17 trillion in debt because we can just monetize the debt; Greece, their financial problem wasn’t as bad as ours but they couldn’t print more money.
We have the benefit — because everybody uses our standard, our dollar — we’re able to print more money. But as soon as people start to back away from that and there’s no confidence in the dollar, this house of cards that has been built comes tumbling down. So there goes the economy all because we ignored the morality of the issues of this administration. -
However, let us allow actual facts to get in the way of blaming glbti people for economic destruction:
The economic cost of homophobia, particularly for countries in the global south, is becoming increasingly clear, according to a panel that spoke at the World Bank on Wednesday. While the continuing invisibility of gays and lesbians means that it’s difficult to get the numbers for a wide-reaching study, the economic cost of homophobia ranges from about 0.1 of a percent to 1.7 percent of GDP, according to Dr. M. V. Lee Badgett, an economics professor at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. In India, where Badgett conducted a case study, the numbers can be narrowed down to 0.1 to 0.7 percent of GDP. For the world’s LGBT population, homophobia can lead to loss of employment, workplace or educational discrimination, poor health, and poverty.
Badgett says that the combined effects of homophobia will manifest into the broader economic climate. “Individual effects [of homophobia] will translate into important economic outputs,” Badgett said, causing lower rates of education, poor health, and poverty, which in turn leads to a lower labor force and high health care costs.
Badgett’s case study of India also highlighted the enormous cost of health care due to homophobia in that country. HIV disparity, depression, and suicide, three health issues that are particularly high among the LGBT population, cost India between $712 million and $23.1 billion in 2012, according to Badgett’s study. “You reduce GDP by this much, you call that a recession, actually,” Bagdett said.
A proposed anti-gay law in Arizona was struck down by Gov. Jan Brewer in February, but a previous discriminatory bill that targeted undocumented immigrants cost the state $140 million in revenue.
Jim Yong Kim, president of the World Bank Group, recently argued in The Washington Post, “Institutionalized discrimination is bad for people and for societies. Widespread discrimination is also bad for economies. There is clear evidence that when societies enact laws that prevent productive people from fully participating in the workforce, economies suffer.”
Discrimination against women is a case in point. A World Bank study last year of 143 economies found that 128 countries still have at least one legal difference in how men and women are treated, which constrains women’s economic opportunities. These barriers include laws that make it impossible for a woman to independently obtain an ID card, own or use property, access credit or get a job.
The economic losses from such discriminatory laws and practices are costly. A study last year found that women’s low economic participation created income losses of 27 percent in the Middle East and North Africa. The same study estimated that raising female employment and entrepreneurship to male levels could improve average income by 19 percent in South Asia and 14 percent in Latin America.
and there is this:
Legal recognition of same-sex relationships:
marriage:
Argentina, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Denmark, France, Iceland, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, England and Wales, Ireland (2014), Scotland (2014), Uruguay, California, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Delaware, D.C., Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, New Hampshire, New York, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington, New Jersey,
As if this was not enough, Louisiana, which Mr. Perkins represented in the House of Representatives, has a per capita gdp of $30,952, ranking 41st in the United States, and lower than 70% of countries with legalized marriage equality.
The facts are quiet clear : glbti people do not destroy economies; bigotry, discrimination, homophobia, and racism, do.
Mr. Perkins - not only are you a few feathers short of the entire chicken, you are also helping to instigate economic perfidy.