Noah writes "It was almost as though New Deal liberalism, once the Democrats’ prevailing ideology, had stopped being an ideology at all but instead had become some ancient language, like Latin or Sanskrit, that Democrats no longer knew how to speak."
He's right. The policy choices made by the Biden administration in 2021 (see my previous comment) show a complete absence of New Deal thinking or strategy. The New Dealers knew in their gut that the Republicans are not idiots to worry about inflation coming from deficits. They tried to offset their spending with tax increases in an effort to be somewhat fiscally responsible. They also made a lot of use of policy that did not require spending. When we think of the New Deal people think of the programs it created, things like Social Security, WPA, CCC, and so on. But that was not core element of what they did, and it surely was not what created the 33 years of spectacular, widely shared prosperity after 1940. What did this was policy implemented mostly during WW II:
But the New Dealers needed to be in a position to do these things. And this meant dealing with the problems of the Depression in a way that people would feel their government was working for them to address the crisis and for them to know who is was that was doing this (FDR and the Democrats) and who had done nothing and was opposing them at every turn (Hoover and the Republicans).
The first thing FDR did coming to offer was give the Populists (ancestors of today's MAGA) what they wanted, ending the tyranny of the gold standard. Falling agricultural prices turning on a dime into rising rises, ending the cycle of bankruptcies for rural America. Dems would pass the Gold Reserve Act in Jan 1934 that allowed FDR to proclaim a new price of gold, earning the government a nice profit which he used to fund a new facility that allowed the New-Dealer-controlled Treasury Department to help manage the economy independently of the Fed. He then moved to act on behalf of the working class with the NRA. This program had noticeable positive effects on many worker's lives and didn't cost the government a dime. Those would be cooperating with FDR would display the Blue Eagle, so voters would know who was "doing their part" to help out in this crisis and who (Republicans) were not. And FDR was on the radio, while it was affecting their lives, reporting to the people directly what he was doing. It was policy *and* politics at the same time. And it had a big impact in that it produced the greatest achievement that FDR ever did, the Democratic landslide in 1934. Had it gone in the usual way the New Deal may have ended up a footnote in history like Teddy Roosevelt's Square Deal. The US might not have entered WW II, and there might have been no postwar boom. Politics matters, but Democrats seem to have forgotten that. They do stuff and then try to sell it during elections, but don't explain what they are doing while they are doing it.
I show the reason why Biden is getting low grades on the economy from working people in the link. The reason is simple. We are in a period of extreme labor tightness, with job openings (demand) exceeding unemployed workers (supply) in which supply-demand forces should generate strong real wage growth. We were in such a situation in the three years before the pandemic and we got the wage growth. I saw it happen in real time in the rising wages our former foster kids were making. People remember the late teens were good times like the late 1990's.
But today we have not seen the real wage increases despite the imbalance of demand over supply. The reason is openings are steadily declining without being filled. This is the slowing effect of the high interest rates. They haven't affected employment yet because we have such an excess of openings, but another year or two of this will pretty much eliminate the excess openings and then unemployment may rise.
So, it's the interest rates that are the difference between Trump and Biden. And the interest rates are high because we have inflationary forces today. These are the result of a deficit 2 percentage points higher under Biden than it was under Trump. In the post I suggested that had Biden coupled repeal of of Trump, Bush and Clinton tax cuts with his pandemic stimulus bill, he would have reduced the impact of the inflation we got and would not be hurting so much in the economy.
In 1952 only 5% of voters were college educated. Premise is invalid. Sentiment of article is far better.
Raise minimum wage, curtailing flimsy asylum escapes and student loan forgiveness are correct policies for times.
Morgage rates will fall with easing inflation. Ideally, in time for November.
Sleepy Joe.
Noah writes "It was almost as though New Deal liberalism, once the Democrats’ prevailing ideology, had stopped being an ideology at all but instead had become some ancient language, like Latin or Sanskrit, that Democrats no longer knew how to speak."
He's right. The policy choices made by the Biden administration in 2021 (see my previous comment) show a complete absence of New Deal thinking or strategy. The New Dealers knew in their gut that the Republicans are not idiots to worry about inflation coming from deficits. They tried to offset their spending with tax increases in an effort to be somewhat fiscally responsible. They also made a lot of use of policy that did not require spending. When we think of the New Deal people think of the programs it created, things like Social Security, WPA, CCC, and so on. But that was not core element of what they did, and it surely was not what created the 33 years of spectacular, widely shared prosperity after 1940. What did this was policy implemented mostly during WW II:
https://mikealexander.substack.com/p/how-inequality-reduction-happened
But the New Dealers needed to be in a position to do these things. And this meant dealing with the problems of the Depression in a way that people would feel their government was working for them to address the crisis and for them to know who is was that was doing this (FDR and the Democrats) and who had done nothing and was opposing them at every turn (Hoover and the Republicans).
The first thing FDR did coming to offer was give the Populists (ancestors of today's MAGA) what they wanted, ending the tyranny of the gold standard. Falling agricultural prices turning on a dime into rising rises, ending the cycle of bankruptcies for rural America. Dems would pass the Gold Reserve Act in Jan 1934 that allowed FDR to proclaim a new price of gold, earning the government a nice profit which he used to fund a new facility that allowed the New-Dealer-controlled Treasury Department to help manage the economy independently of the Fed. He then moved to act on behalf of the working class with the NRA. This program had noticeable positive effects on many worker's lives and didn't cost the government a dime. Those would be cooperating with FDR would display the Blue Eagle, so voters would know who was "doing their part" to help out in this crisis and who (Republicans) were not. And FDR was on the radio, while it was affecting their lives, reporting to the people directly what he was doing. It was policy *and* politics at the same time. And it had a big impact in that it produced the greatest achievement that FDR ever did, the Democratic landslide in 1934. Had it gone in the usual way the New Deal may have ended up a footnote in history like Teddy Roosevelt's Square Deal. The US might not have entered WW II, and there might have been no postwar boom. Politics matters, but Democrats seem to have forgotten that. They do stuff and then try to sell it during elections, but don't explain what they are doing while they are doing it.
https://mikealexander.substack.com/p/how-the-new-dealers-gained-the-ability
I show the reason why Biden is getting low grades on the economy from working people in the link. The reason is simple. We are in a period of extreme labor tightness, with job openings (demand) exceeding unemployed workers (supply) in which supply-demand forces should generate strong real wage growth. We were in such a situation in the three years before the pandemic and we got the wage growth. I saw it happen in real time in the rising wages our former foster kids were making. People remember the late teens were good times like the late 1990's.
But today we have not seen the real wage increases despite the imbalance of demand over supply. The reason is openings are steadily declining without being filled. This is the slowing effect of the high interest rates. They haven't affected employment yet because we have such an excess of openings, but another year or two of this will pretty much eliminate the excess openings and then unemployment may rise.
So, it's the interest rates that are the difference between Trump and Biden. And the interest rates are high because we have inflationary forces today. These are the result of a deficit 2 percentage points higher under Biden than it was under Trump. In the post I suggested that had Biden coupled repeal of of Trump, Bush and Clinton tax cuts with his pandemic stimulus bill, he would have reduced the impact of the inflation we got and would not be hurting so much in the economy.
https://mikealexander.substack.com/p/the-beveridge-curve-and-cultural