I’ve been thinking lately the definition of crime—or at least the way it’s treated—is kind of relative. The consequences of a harmful act differ widely depending on the social and economic position of the person or group that does the harm.
Corporations and CEOs whose safety shortcuts harm or kill workers on the job usually get away with it, while working class and poor people do serious time for minor offenses.
Some wealthy people cash in on subsidies for industries that damage water, land, wildlife, and public health… but a poor person can get nailed for littering (not that I’m in favor of littering).
Executives at financial institutions whose predatory practices have wiped out families’ life savings have gotten huge bonuses, while petty theft is often punished.
Woody Guthrie summed this up in his Ballad of Pretty Boy Floyd, about a Depression-era robber who became a kind of folk hero:
Yes, as through this world I've wandered
I've seen lots of funny men;
Some will rob you with a six-gun,
And some with a fountain pen.
To bring Woody up—or down—to date, I’d also have to say that some will kill with a weapon and some with a vote or a policy decision. And it’s happening here and now.
We can start with the impact of cuts to health care in the Big Brutal Bill (not counting the hardships caused by the recent shutdown). Earlier this year, public health officials from Yale and the University estimated that cuts to Medicaid and other health programs would cause 51,000 U.S. deaths per year when fully implemented.
Specifically, the researchers estimate that 42,500 lives could be lost each year from disenrollments in Medicaid and Marketplace coverage and the rollback of nursing home staffing rules. An additional 8,811 deaths are projected from the expiration of the enhanced Affordable Care Act (ACA) Premium Tax Credits, bringing the total to more than 51,000.
That doesn’t count collateral damage of the current government shutdown or collateral damage done by cuts to other programs such as food assistance or the ongoing damage caused by hospital closings, job losses, debt, stress, and economic insecurity.
To quote Bishop William Barber, “We have to start talking about this budget as a form of social and political murder, social and political deadliness, because they know. And the reason I use the word ‘murder’ is because they know that it’s going to cause death.”
Then there are the even greater number of premature deaths that are already starting to happen in the world’s less wealthy nations due to cuts in USAID food and health assistance since the agency was effectively killed this year, with the majority in congress supporting still more cuts to spending already allocated.
No program is perfect, but a study of USAID work over the past 21 years published in the British medical journal The Lancet showed that it really was working before it was gutted.
During those years when it was functioning, the researchers found a 15 percent decrease in mortality rates by all causes and a 32 percent decrease in children dying under age five. That amounts to helping around 91 million people overall and more than 30 million kids.
This includes a 65 percent reduction in mortality from HIV/AIDS, representing 25.5 million lives saved; 51 percent from malaria, or 8 million; neglected diseases, for around 9 million; as well as decreases in death caused by tuberculosis, nutritional deficiencies, respiratory infections, and maternal and perinatal conditions. These beneficial effects were felt in dozens of countries. Between 2017 and 2000, the program provided assistance in 240 natural disasters and crises.
That was then; this is now. According to forecasting models used by the Lancet author, the cuts will result in more than 14 million additional all-age deaths, including over 4.5 million children under five by 2030.
Compared to these numbers, movie bad guys seem like amateurs.
And none of this had to happen. We’re not like dinosaurs hit by a meteor or medieval peasants suffering from famine through a crop failure or plague victims who haven’t figured out how to wash their hands. All of these deaths could have easily been prevented, And many of our leaders who could have helped block this went along with it.
Washing one’s hands of innocent suffering didn’t do much for the reputation of Pontius Pilate… and I doubt it will for others in the long run.
This piece by was originally published on December 12, 2025 in the Charleston Gazette-Mail.