Inflation is a problem for many. Republicans jump to say inflation’s bad. But they’ve said nothing about what to do about it. That leaves us only general impressions of how well the parties handle economics.
There’s plenty of evidence the economy does better under Democratic presidents – they prefer to invest in the general welfare. Republicans prefer to celebrate the rich. The rich love the tax breaks Republicans give them, and those who vote for Republicans may be drawn to the idea that they’ll benefit from whatever Republicans do for the rich. As Tevye said in Fiddler on the Roof, “If you’re rich, they think you really know.” [If you haven’t seen Fiddler, you’ve missed a great show.]
Republicans prefer to blame the poor and make them out to be the root of all evil – though they keep making more of them. Worried about corruption in government? Go after the poor for the pittances doled out on their behalf. But cheer the enormous tax breaks that let the rich pay less of their income than the rest of us.
Worried about tax cheats? Leave the rich alone and go after the poor. The poor must be where the money is; they’re homeless or sleeping in their cars because they’ve foolishly hidden the money from themselves lest we find their wealth.
Afraid the economy is in bad shape? Republicans happily throw people out of work; that’ll fix it by reducing the buying power of the newly unemployed. They want to make money they can spend buying what others make and sell – how subversive; stop them!
Everybody knows the laws of supply and demand. It was excellent, new economics in the eighteenth century. That two-century old microeconomics does an OK job explaining the behavior of individual people and firms. But Republicans want Adam Smith’s analysis to be a twenty-first century theory of everything. They haven’t noticed that early in the last century, a Brit named Keynes realized that the economy tanks, taking everybody and their companies with them, when companies go too far firing, foreclosing, or otherwise capturing what little the rest of us have. It’s like a run on the bank. Economy-wide rules are different from the rules that apply to individual people, companies and banks. Republicans still haven’t caught up with that. Must be too complicated for them.
Think the economy could use some investment in public goods, infrastructure, schools, public health and the like? Democrats adopt the Nike slogan – just do it! By contrast, Republicans respond that it’s too expensive and if it were worth doing, business would have taken care of the problem – leaving the persistence of things like lead in the water supply totally mysterious. Or they claim tax breaks for the wealthiest would solve all problems, so it should be surprising that people Republicans like to call “job-creators” didn’t change their preference to invest in China or outsource American jobs or have a great time vacationing in Fiji. One former Republican Secretary of Commerce told me privately that the evidence showed the tax breaks went to build McMansions. I guess they’re nice to look at.
I once thought Republicans were level-headed pragmatists, but on economics, they can’t pass up the chance to use a single ideological idea for everything it wasn’t intended to do. Not the people to trust with our economy.
The moral of the story: The most effective way to make progress for all America is to plan to vote, see that your friends do too, and reach out to friends in swing districts and states.
Steve Gottlieb’s latest book is Unfit for Democracy: The Roberts Court and The Breakdown of American Politics. He is the Jay and Ruth Caplan Distinguished Professor Emeritus at Albany Law School, served on the New York Civil Liberties Union board, on the New York Advisory Committee to the U.S. Civil Rights Commission, and as a US Peace Corps Volunteer in Iran.
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