Della is station 7 on the battery line I own outside Cleveland, Tennessee. Station 7 is to say a 34-year-old woman who’s run the electrolyte fill on a 2,800-cell pack for 6 years, and whose lungs I haven’t measured since the third quarter of 2023. The polite word keeps the spirometer out of the conversation. The honest word would require me to think about her FEV1 between the second and the third conference call, and the third conference call is where I’d rather be.

The vapor is n-methyl-2-pyrrolidone. The exposure limit is 10 ppm. The respirator would cost $2,850 a year per worker. The line has 312 workers. I keep the $889,200. The respirator sits in the supply closet. The vapor at her station was last sampled in 2019. The result’s in a file I haven’t opened.

The cordless drill on your workbench came through Della’s station. You’ve charged it 200 times. You’ve held the battery in your hand. The battery’s rated for 1,500 cycles. The cycle is paid for in solvent you’ll never smell. Grace and peace to you, friend. The line ships on schedule.

You were told this week, in Fox News, that the federal debt is approaching $40 trillion and that the ratio of debt to GDP is 125%. You were told the figure is unsustainable. You were told that someone must pay. You were told to demand that Congress cut the spending that keeps Della’s lungs between conference calls. You’ve been told to demand exactly what I haven’t yet asked you to demand, but have been arranging for you to demand on my behalf.

Watch the chain. When the Medicaid line is cut, Della’s pulmonologist visits stop. The 10 ppm continues. The cough that began in the third quarter of 2023 becomes the cough that the urgent care clinic charges her $185 to evaluate. The clinic charges her $185 because the state’s contribution is no longer in the budget. Della’s credit card balance, which carries 24.99% interest on the unpaid $185, becomes the place the maintenance has been relocated. The state used to cover the visit. The state stopped covering the visit. The line ran anyway.

When the SNAP line is cut, Della’s groceries shrink. She works 10 hours a day on the food she can afford. The cafeteria no longer subsidizes the shift meal. She brings rice. The line ran anyway.

When the EITC line is cut, Della’s rent check doesn’t cover the gap. She moves 11 miles east, into a room above a wash-and-fold, to make the math. The commute extends 38 minutes each way. She sleeps 5.7 hours a night. The line ran anyway.

You call this fiscal discipline. I call it a relocation of maintenance expense. The author’s $40 trillion debt is my preferred inventory of underpriced labor. The cuts he wants are the cuts I’ve been quietly writing into my own budget since 2019. I haven’t had to ask him to make them. He’s made them on my behalf.

Now hold that battery and walk 600 miles east, into the long-term care corridor I own outside Erie, Pennsylvania. Joss is the second-shift CNA on the dementia wing. She’s 38. She’s the hand that turns your mother at 3 AM, if your mother’s still with us. She turns and lifts 11 residents between 11 PM and 7 AM. Her spine is on my books at $3,500. The lift that would save it’s in my catalog at the same price. The Lord, I’m told, numbers the hairs. I’ve priced the spine. I haven’t pulled the lift in 6 years.

The corridor has 44 residents. The day shift has 3 CNAs. The evening shift has 2. The night shift has 2. The state minimum on nights is 1 CNA to 18 residents. I keep 2, because 2 is the smallest number that lets the corridor stay staffed when one calls in sick — which is the smallest number that lets the night supervisor not have to come in — which is the smallest number that lets my labor cost line stay where the spreadsheet wants it. Joss turns each resident every 2 hours to prevent bedsores. The turning is done by hand. The lift would let one CNA do the work of two. The lift would save me the second CNA at $16.40 an hour, about $34,000 a year. The second CNA is cheaper than the spine. I keep the second CNA.

Joss earns $17.10 an hour. She’s earned $17.10 an hour since 2021. She works 32 hours a week because I don’t offer full-time, because full-time would push her above the Medicaid threshold for the residents she tends, which would change her benefits, which would cost me a small fraction more than the $16.40 an hour I save by keeping her part-time. The state covers her son’s pediatrician. The state covers her groceries. The state covers her rent. What I keep pays for the corridor. What the state keeps pays for her. The corridor is profitable. She’s part-time.

I run the dependence stage cleanly, profitably, and haven’t lost a corridor to a regulator in 12 years. I run 14 long-term care facilities across 3 states. The graduate who wrote your administrator’s billing manual sat in my seminar. $630,000 a year is what I’d save by equipping every corridor — and what I don’t save lands on her disk. I keep the $630,000. Her disks keep the savings. The Medicaid check covers her surgery when the disk ruptures. The Medicaid check covers her physical therapy when the disk fails again. The corridor is mine. The disk is hers. The unfunded obligation is mine.

I’m told the unfunded obligations are $86 trillion. The unfunded obligations are my revenue. I haven’t modeled what happens if the obligations get funded. I’ve audited the corridor. The corridor is fully staffed, by my lights. Joss arrives at 11 PM. Joss will turn the resident at 3 AM by hand. The Medicaid check clears on the 15th. The worker’s comp premium went up 4% last year, which is in my file. The lift is in my catalog, where it’s been since 2019. The catalog is the budget.

I am not unusual. I am a curriculum. I’ve taught this arithmetic for 30 years. My textbook is in 40 programs. The man who wrote the Fox News piece was in my 2014 seminar. The senator who’ll sign the spending cut was in my 2019 seminar. The aide who’ll draft the work requirement is in my 2024 cohort. The graduate who wrote your administrator’s billing manual sat in my seminar. The best of them run the subtraction faster than I do. I say so with pride. They make themselves, in offices I’ve never entered, by graduates who’ve moved past me. I don’t need to know their names.

Now widen the frame, because the spine is one corridor and the corridor is one line item and the battery line is one floor. In 1834 the English Parliament passed the Poor Law Amendment Act. The principle was called “less eligibility.” The condition of the relieved pauper was to be made less desirable than the condition of the lowest-paid independent labourer. The workhouse was built from brick. The relief was to be made worse than the worst job so that the worst job would be accepted. The author’s spending cuts are the same arithmetic, written from a different ledger. When the Medicaid line is cut, the relieved worker’s condition becomes less eligible than the worst job. When the SNAP line is cut, the relieved worker’s food becomes less eligible than the worst food. When the EITC line is cut, the relieved worker’s rent becomes less eligible than the worst rent. The principle isn’t new. The principle is the country.

A man writing for Fox News this month quoted a passage widely attributed to Alexander Tytler — that democracies collapse when voters discover they can vote themselves largesse. He treats it as a warning. I treat it as a receipt. The largesse he fears is the Medicaid that keeps Della’s lungs between shifts. The collapse he predicts is the maintenance phase of my own balance sheet. He’s not warning the country. He’s describing the country I’ve built.

Here is the verse I’ve been saving for the lesson.

“Friend, I do thee no wrong: didst not thou agree with me for a penny? Take that thine is, and go thy way: I will give unto this last, even as unto thee. Is it not lawful for me to do what I will with mine own? Is thine eye evil, because I am good?” — Matthew 20:13-15, KJV

The agreed wage is the agreed wage. Regret isn’t a labor claim. The landowner paid what he chose. The complaint was recorded. The complaint is the sin. I’ve paid Della the denarius I chose. I’ve paid Joss the denarius I chose. The complaint is theirs.

The respirator box has been in the supply closet since 2019. The lift’s in my catalog. The cordless drill on your workbench holds a charge. Joss will be at her station tonight. I look forward to the third quarter. The catalog is the budget.

— Sterling A. Varice

Sterling A. Varice holds the Hayek-Friedman Chair and serves as Dean of Instruction at Warden University’s College of Business and Economics in Richmond, Virginia. He is the author of three textbooks: Divine Mandates for Labor Utilization, Social Obligations for Profit Maximization, and Calibrated Deprivation: A Manager’s Guide to Employee Motivation.