Douthat on social mobility

You know your country's got a problem with social mobility when even Ross Douthat thinks so:

As Republicans refine their proposals [...] they need to focus more on economic mobility than the Ryan budget does. Public policy is going to be made from inside a fiscal straitjacket for the foreseeable future. But within that straitjacket, Washington can favor policies that enhance working-class opportunity, while ruthlessly paring back those that subsidize the affluent. The goal shouldn’t just be small government, but what the economist Edward Glaeser calls “small-government egalitarianism.”
There are elements of this vision woven into the Ryan budget — cuts to farm subsidies, means-testing for Medicare, and promises to go after tax expenditures that primarily benefit the rich. But at least in its initial draft, too much of the budget’s austerity is borne by downscale Americans. The Ryan proposal would repeal the Obama health care plan without replacing it, throwing the uninsured back into a broken insurance marketplace. It would trim Medicaid more enthusiastically than corporate welfare. And its central economic premise — that lowering marginal tax rates guarantees widely shared prosperity — was tested and found wanting during the Bush era.

I think Douthat is an ideological hack, but I'm glad that this discussion is happening on the Right. I honestly never thought I would hear a Republican suggest that trickle-down doesn't work. He still thinks the Ryan budget is a serious proposal, but this is the first glimmer of hope I've seen in a while that there are mainstream, relatively high-profile Republicans who care about governing (as opposed to just winning elections). Now if only he were in Congress...