President Joe Biden is on the campaign trail today. He wants prospective voters to know that EVERYONE is doing better economically thanks to Bidenomics. As I write this post, I am watching MSNBC. Both Chris Hayes and Alex Wagner want voters to understand that they are doing well economically, even if it doesn’t “feel” like it. According to Hayes, Wagner, and a host of Biden apologists, the numbers don’t lie: unemployment is down, wages are up, and inflation declining. In their minds, these macro numbers prove that Biden’s economic policies work. Americans are better off, even if they don’t feel they are.
Here’s the problem with this kind of thinking: Americans live in a micro world, not a macro one. The macro numbers parroted by Biden and his defenders do not represent what is actually taking place on the ground in what MSNBC often derisively calls “flyover land” — the Midwest — you know where all those MAGA people live. Biden touts new jobs, yet fails to explain how total employment is static. No one bothers to question how accurate unemployment numbers are. Only people who are drawing unemployment are counted as unemployed. People no longer or unable to seek employment are not counted. Nary a word is said about what percentage of American jobs pay a living wage. Nothing is said about those who are working part-time jobs because they can’t find well-paying full-time jobs. The same can be said for the inflation rate. This rate is always quoted in insolation of what has taken place in the past. Rarely, do Americans recover purchasing power lost. Wage increases never seem to outstrip inflation.
Here’s what I know. In the past two years, our utility bills, insurance, and groceries have all done up — often dramatically. Our medical costs are a runaway freight train. Housing costs are up. Interest rates are up. Real estate taxes are up. Entertainment costs are up. (But, Bruce, gas prices are down! Yea, Team Biden, right?) These expenses have, for the most part, outstripped inflation. Wages are flat, unable to keep up with rising prices. If an employer raises wages 3% every year, it will take workers more than five years to regain the purchasing power lost in 2021-2022 alone. All is NOT well for Midwestern working-class people. Biden and defenders telling us that it is “all in our heads” does not reflect how life really is for us. And until Biden understands this and changes his tune, he can expect to continue to alienate voters. Biden, along with his cheerleaders at MSNBC need to personally come to the Midwest and actually talk to working-class people. To quote Fox Mulder, “the truth is out there.”
Of course, Biden will ignore people like me, as will Chris Hayes, Joy Reid, and Alex Wagner. I just don’t understand “economics.” I am just an uneducated country bumpkin. Maybe, but here’s what I know: my wife and I have less discretionary income than we had two years ago, our expenses are outstripping inflation, our wages are in decline (when adjusted for inflation), our debt is increasing, and medical costs are out of control. Worse, my wife’s employer laid off workers and she has been on a reduced schedule since October. The promised raise never materialized, and when one does eventually materialize it will likely be 25-40 cents. In the meantime, the company raised insurance premiums, stopped 401K contributions, and is hanging on for dear life. So much for the awesomeness of Biden’s economy.
But, Bruce, the macro numbers say _________________. Sorry, but we live in a micro world — a world where bank balances matter, not labor statistics. And if Biden can’t or won’t understand this, he shouldn’t be surprised when he loses the 2024 presidential election. Unlike the talking heads at MSNBC, I actually have my finger on the pulse of Midwestern workers. They are my spouse, children, grandchildren, friends, and neighbors. I understand their questions and fears. I listen to them talk while in line at the grocery, sitting in stands for a basketball game, or having dinner at a local restaurant. I hear their worries and concerns. One thing is clear, Biden and the Democrats are clueless about what Midwestern people think, and what it is that drives their fears. (And Republicans are no better.)
Bruce Gerencser, 66, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 45 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
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Yeah. I can’t stomach MSNBC. Never could stomach FOX News. I do think there needs to be a push for unions and at least the Democratic party seems to give some lip service to that, but they’ve all but lost the mid to lower white working class because their policies don’t match their rhetoric, or so I might say. I see the US in the predicament of funding the vast military industrial complex which is now an indispensable part of the economy (excise that, and the US organism is dead) to the point that it can’t keep up the safety nets, which some Republicans gleefully want to get rid of anyhow. Yes, the US is not in a good place, for sure. The chickens are coming home to roost. But your point is so important. They need to really listen to the tune of real people. Then maybe they can come up with a tune that is actually in some harmony with that.
Yes, politicians really need to pay attention to people on the ground. I get that white male MAGAs are aggrieved partly due to their racism ,misogyny, and xenophobia, but there are some real issues too. Reaganomics and resulting policies that benefit the wealthy and allow businesses to reap massive profits while paying employees peanuts has been massively harmful.
I work in a specialized industry and have direct insight into costs of materials, which have been dramatically decreasing over the past year. Shipping prices have reduced, container prices have reduced. But have we reduced pur prices to customers? Not really……
I’ve witnessed many presidential campaigns in my lifetime and can’t think of any where the economy was not a major focus. The case is always that my guy will make your financial troubles disappear. There are always people struggling financially in this country. It’s also easy to convince a significant portion of the electorate that they are struggling a lot more than they really are. Fence straddling Trumpers only need this push to rationalize voting for this orange menace. So if Democrats highlight their accomplishments they are being insensitive to people who are struggling and if they don’t they implicitly confirm the position that the economy sucks.
You are right that the economy is doing bad. But, yes, there are always ways to spin the numbers that make it look better.
Personally, I think a lot of bad news is coming in the decade ahead. It appears that the critical middle distillates of petroleum, which is the source of diesel fuel, jet fuel and marine bunker fuel, are in terminal decline. That means we will keep seeing less of these as the years go by. And so much depends on having these fuels available for transportation. Without them, the economy cannot go up. I expect a gradual decline in the economy for a long time.
And natural gas and coal are also in limited supply. And worldwide we find ourselves needing to mine lower grade minerals at great expense. The good stuff is already gone.
And I don’t think anybody is going to change that basic fact. Biden will take the blame, but in the end, this would have happened with anybody.
Yes, government can and should help the poorest. Perhaps somebody could do better at that than Biden, but I don’t see how anybody is going to make the whole economy thrive.
I am surprised Biden did not have a serious challenger this year. I think it will be hard for him to win in the general election. He should have stepped aside and opened it up to somebody new.
Bravo Bruce, Bravo! As a 66 year old part-time semi retired school bus driver drawing a meager social security, I get it. Honestly, I suspect that I will completely retire the second my heart stops beating. At times, I find that I am looking forward to it.
Me too Bob. All the hardships, chaos, and frustrations that burden my life fade before the realization I won’t have to endure it much longer. That being so, it squanders my dwindling brain cells to care. It just ain’t mattering to me not no more. That anything ever mattered was a momentary delusion.
Once we elected Reagan we were doomed to this. Society must always take care of ALL people in it. We have enough technology to do this but the effects (people losing jobs etc.) of technology must be payed by ALL the people especially the wealthy. We should have a 30 hour work week so the jobs are spread around to more people. We need more safety nets not fewer. Reagan said if we just get the awful Federal government off the backs of the people we would all be better financially. That is not what happened. The middle class has gotten less and less and the wealthy have gotten more. The Republicans are still spreading this message. Biden has not fixed much but he needs both houses of Congress to work with him.
True Barbara. At long last, realization spreads how much damage Reagan left behind. I always wondered if Reagan was calculatedly leading his followers into nonsense or was his brain misfiring long before his dementia was known? In my own life I experienced more than one puzzling person who in later years became frankly demented due to brain tumors or other occult problems incubated and slowly growing for years.
I’d say that Reagan definitely knew what he was doing ! There was a manifesto created by an ally of Nixon’s, Louis Powell Jr. He was appointed as a judge by him as well. The Powell Memo,from 1971 laid out the blueprint for the ruin of the middle class and working class citizens, but it wasn’t publicized at that time and has been under wraps, unless someone tells you about it. Ever since the takeouts of the Kennedy brothers and MLK, we’ve been going into Neoliberalism mode, regardless of party and labels. Businesses are still closing, the homeless population is always increasing because the jobs out there just don’t cover market rate rents. Neoliberals promote scarcity, by their actions. It makes sense to directly call the local Democrat Party offices, and warn them that this indifferent behavior towards average people will not just cost the election, but propel us into outright Fascism, Orangeina has made this plain( Project 2025). I had to very reluctantly vote for Biden. Bernie Sanders wasn’t up to the role,due to his health. He backed Biden, once he bowed out. And here we are again. Restaurants and CVS, Right Aid, are closing stores, just like during COVID-19. I was studying Reinhardt Galen, and certain kinds of local crimes in Southern California,last night. It’s because of the 70th anniversary of the Black Dahlia murders, and how it wasn’t just E. Short who was their victim. Cali is a hub for many things, including space, military and national government. Now, if things go too fast, people will catch on, so this was done incrementally. And if people can be induced to fight each other,instead of actually seeing what these DC insiders are doing to us, the ruin of this nation is done deal ! Where I live, you’ve had crowds of mostly kids rushing stores, grabbing things, not being stopped. It plays into Orangeina’s claim to crack down with ” law and order” very well. Bad economies fuel crime,and he knows it. Jobs and manufacturing are still allowed to be sent overseas,right ? So a factory or two pops up, but many more are going to Mexico, China,etc. Potempkin Politics, rot behind the facade. They know that most people won’t go to a chicken farm to inspect conditions, and try to prevent another die- off, which boost the profits of Big Food. And check your prescription bottles for the manufacturing company ” CAMBER.” They’re in India, and famous for placebo level meds ! Lots of bad reviews. After the MLK holiday, I’m making those calls. Yeah, 2024 is pretty grim. It reminds me of 1933 Germany.
I am as worried as you are about a 1933 Germany outcome as you are if Trump gets elected.
I have pondered the very real possibility that if Trump is re-elected—or De Santis,
Haley or Ramaswamy is elected—I will end up dead or in prison.
If Biden is re-elected, such scenarios could also come to pass if for no other reason that religio-fascists could react like cornered animals and take it out on LGBTQ people or any other scapegoat of their choice.
But economically, I don’t see things getting better economically for most people, regardless of who is elected. Some of that has to do with the factors Merle has mentioned. But I also think the political situation bears blame. To put it bluntly, in spite of what Faux News would have us believe, there isn’t a liberal-left alternative. Bernie Sanders is probably the closest we came, but he wasn’t going to win more than a few primaries.
I am a registered Democrat because in my state, you can’t be an independent and vote in primaries. And I vote for Democrats even though the party today is more like what the Republican Party before It entangled itself with the religious right and neoliberalism. Almost any Democrat who gets elected to a national, or significant statewide, office is doing the bidding of the financial services industries and other corporate interests. Much of this has to do with, as Barbara and Yulya point out, Reagan’s policies. But his predecessor Jimmy Carter, intentionally or not, laid the groundwork for Reagan’s policies. He actually began the deregulation of industries that Reagan accelerated. Some of Carter’s impetus came from the fact that as a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, he was a globalist even before the term was in use—the CFR’s claims of “neutrality “ notwithstanding. In fact, it might be argued that Carter wouldn’t have become
President otherwise. Every Democratic president—and anyone who had a serious chance of becoming one (Hillary Clinton, anyone?) was also a globalist. That means, by definition, that they thought in macro- rather than micro-economic terms , which focuses on borderleas wealth rather than wage-earners.
Meanwhile Republicans can’t see beyond leftie wokism, same sex marriage, and abortion. None of which affect the amount that goes into their pay packet. If there were just one thing I could suggest from this side of the pond (and I don’t for one moment think we haven’t got mega problems of our own), it’d be sort out medical care. Bankrupting people because of healthcare is a morally reprehensible state of affairs.
First I’ll concede “Bidenomics” is b.s., though really more like classic salesmanship (and in this case premature). The President has very little to do with the success or failure of the economy. Despite this, the President has the most to gain and the most to lose if the economy isn’t doing well. I’ll also add that inflation is the worst thing for a President. But if not the President then who? That would be Jerome Powell and the Federal Reserve (and to a lesser extent congress). Why 40 years of fed targeted 2% inflation and then BOOM here it is again? Was it merely from Biden putting his hand on his gargantuan Catholic Bible taking his oath of office what ushered it in? Not by a long shot. Inflation was a federal reserve (and congress to some extent) policy during the Trump administration to keep the economy afloat while millions of Americans forced to stay inside because of Covid 19 quarantine policy. Powell also delayed by at least a year when the Fed should have started raising rates again (and Powell has conceded as much–should have listened to me!). Now that I’ve established that the President doesn’t have much to do with the actual economy, but is subject to its success how do things look? Well it is a lagging indicator, though I think the “little guys in the Midwest” are starting to feel the effects. Listen to Trump and Fox news, Trump hopes the economy falters so his presumed second term doesn’t suffer a crash or depending on the day he’ll just take credit for Biden’s economy.
To me it is imperative that Biden be re-elected for the simple reason that Trump will once again be his opponent. We’d have 4 years that would be like the Trump-Biden interregnum. This only happens if people are fat and happy. If all goes well Trump will be crying about the rigged 2024 election. Let him. I’ll also predict if Trump is still breathing he’ll be a candidate in 2028.
(I’d also add that even if you only have $400 in the bank, you’re not “$400 away from bankruptcy”. Sure most people are underwater with debuts, in many cases owe more than they’re worth, but you’re not going to declare bankruptcy. The cartoon is too absurd for me not to criticize it.)
I agree with you that the president does not have control of the economy but is blamed or exalted for it. We need something like a Federal Reserve for the working people. I do not know how to achieve this, but everyone should have a place to live, food, and medicine even if they never do a bit of “economic” work because there will be little room for working people once AI takes is used more widely. I worked as a “computer programmer” (which is an old term) for 30 years and most technology companies do not care one bit about the average person except in what they consume from the economy.
The federal reserve is better for “working people” as it is, with provisions to avoid it becoming a political football (appointed by President/confirm by congress, but with terms of office that stagger the usual election cycle to keep it from being too political. The reason I say this, is because inflation hurts the little guy more than anything else. For example, most states have a state minimum wage, but not the Bible Belt, where the absurd federal minimum prevails. So inflation is a way to stick it to the poor of the south a.k.a. “Old Black Joe.”
One thing that is telling about Donald Trump, he recently had a tirade against the Federal reserve, complaining that they are trying to help Joe Biden and asserting that he’d like to take more control over it (if he is elected in 2024). And that is the temptation for politicians, with control over the Fed, a short term economic kick is very easy to achieve, but of course inflation always will follow… but maybe not until the next guy!
Thoughtful folks will appreciate a commentary by Steve Schmidt, a political operative who got Bush Sr. and Schwartzenegger elected. It’s about human nature’s relation to politics, not about parties. Very insightful.