Turn to any local or national newspaper. The front page abounds with a level of emotional, financial, and physical hostility and violence in President Biden’s America that turns Maslow’s hierarchy of needs pyramid into very difficult goals. Abraham Maslow was a twentieth-century humanist psychologist. He believed human beings are motivated by satisfying an ever more complex set of needs that he placed into a hierarchical order that fit nicely in the shape of a pyramid.
Individuals and societies demonstrate a variety of social and physical needs. How well those lower-level needs are satisfied rests on individual capabilities and safety nets provided by local, state, and federal government. Furthermore, some measure of a well-ordered society, of course, delivers protection from violence and theft and provides for emotional stability, health, and financial security. And lastly, among the lower order needs is the need for friendships and family bonds along with physical and emotional intimacy. But in Biden’s America, satisfying even these lower-order requirements becomes challenging.
There is a widening gap between those able to provide for basic physiological needs like food, water, clothing, and shelter and those who can’t. The current Department of Housing and Urban Development explains that 18 out of every 1,000 Americans experienced homelessness in 2020. And with the Biden inflation, the poor’s ability to afford shelter will not improve.
In an article written for Politico, Eleanor Mueller reported:
“Rising prices have historically squeezed workers with lower incomes more than their higher-paid counterparts, particularly during economic downturns — not only because workers with lower incomes have less wealth to fall back on, but because the goods they purchase most increase more in price, and they are less able to seek out lower-priced substitutes.”
Andrew Moran, Liberty Nation’s resident economist, explained: “The Penn Wharton Budget Model analysis discovered that low- and middle-income folks spent 7% more last year on the same products they bought in 2020 and 2019, totaling approximately $3,500. Rich households’ spending jumped by close to 6%.” In other words, those struggling on the lower end of the needs pyramid are impacted most by “Bidenflation.”
What about the next level of needs? Say you’ve met the need for food and shelter. Are you protected from violence and theft? In Biden-World, the answer would be no. LN’s Leesa Donner explained:
“The year 2021 is shaping up to be quite the boon for criminal activity across the United States. Homicides are up in the Big Apple 45% and shootings 78%. In Chicago, the murder rate has risen 16% and shootings 25%. In Washington, D.C., police data reveal a 16-year high, with a 43% rise in homicides.”
Looking just at Chicago, Axios reported in December of last year, “Over 1,000 homicides have already been recorded in Cook County in 2021, and we still have a month to go.” Additionally, nightly news programs show continuous examples of thieves breaking into high-end retail stores, smashing display cases, and making off with tens of thousands of dollars in merchandise. The New York Post reported, “Shocking surveillance footage captures armed smash-and-grab crooks swiping at least $1 million in watches from a Chicago Lamborghini dealership – a crime which the owner angrily blamed on Democratic bail reforms.” A Fox News article agrees, telling readers, “Americans worry about soaring crime rate – Democrats respond by standing up for criminals.” Not to put too fine a point on it, but Americans disapprove of President Biden’s handling of crime by a margin of 61% to 39%.
Lastly, as a society, do Americans have an opportunity to satisfy the need for love and belonging? Looking specifically at family bonds, here too, the future is bleak. The United States Congress Joint Economic Committee report, “The Demise of the Happy Two-Parent Home,” quotes the assessment of Princeton University’s Sara McLanahan, who observed: “If we were asked to design a system for making sure that children’s basic needs were met, we would probably come up with something quite similar to the two-parent ideal.” The Pew Research Center reported that even China and the third world countries of Nigeria, Mali, and Uganda have lower percentages of single-parent families than the U.S.
Building personal esteem, self-respect, and the fulfillment of a person’s “full potential” by acquiring the level of self-actualization Maslow describes is not impossible. But, when you are worried about being gunned down in your neighborhood or having your family-owned grocery robbed or burned to the ground, it’s hard to remember that you are trying to achieve Maslow’s self-actualization. In Biden-World the trend is in the wrong direction.
The views expressed are those of the author and not of any other affiliation.
~ Read more from Dave Patterson.
