Thanks for responding.  I never really thought about how that might be a controversial opinion but it does ring true the more I think about it.  My self-described &quot;libertarian&quot; friends don&#x27;t believe in the same social policies I do and don&#x27;t believe in the same correlations between social policies and economic success.<p>I&#x27;m sure you already knew this but I figured I&#x27;d share it anyways:  After thinking about it last night I decided I believed in a &quot;trickle up effect&quot; and then went to google it, thinking it a nice take on the &quot;trickle down effect,&quot; only to find that &quot;trickle up effect&quot; was the original and &quot;trickle down&quot; was apparently the clever take down...  Sigh.  Guess I should have paid more attention in Economics.<p>Anyways, like most economic theories I&#x27;m sure there are a myriad of reasons why it might not work or be the most effective (which you graciously decided to not go into.)