A helpful concept in thinking about these things is the old Marxist idea — endorsed by the likes of Gertrude Himmelfarb — of the cash nexus. The cash nexus is the weakest of all social and economic bonds and is not capable of holding things together. Wherever older and tighter ties of family, friendship, caste, and community which can also facilitate economic exchanges (albeit cashless ones) are replaced by the cash nexus, society is weakened. To take one obvious example, conservative leaders and spokesmen ought to be saying loud and often that with a few exceptions, anyone who would place an infant in daycare is a negligent parent and a negligent citizen. A few will, but most won’t for fear of offending too many constituents and of all the Jim Geraghty’s of the world calling them a killjoy.
