WHO’S BETTER WITH OUR BUCKS?
While rummaging through some presidential polls last week, I found one that said Biden led Trump in every category except one: managing the economy. In that category Trump led Biden by nine points.
I was stunned—not that the old canard was still alive, but that the size of the spread was so large, considering the man favored in the poll has gone through six personal bankruptcies and now presides over the greatest economic catastrophe to plague the nation since the Great Depression of the 1930s.
Don’t listen to that discredited trickle-down theory nonsense the Republicans keep trotting out for you to buy. To hear them tell it, give tax breaks to those atop the financial pyramid and the money will “trickle” down to the base, making everybody happy. We’ve practiced it for 40 years, so why isn’t everybody happy? Maybe that yellow stream trickling down on you is not liquid gold; it’s a far more common fluid you’ll find on the floor of many a men’s restroom.
Since I’ve been researching the subject for my next book (my tenth), I thought I’d share with you some of my findings. No, Republicans are decidedly not the best stewards of our national economy. Democrats are. Since World War II, the Gross National Product has grown by 4.4 percent annually when Democrats are in charge; under Republicans it’s grown an average of 2.5 percent—a substantial difference. But why? Economists are not sure. Some suggest that the GOP fondness for tax cuts for the wealthy while increasing the military budget may be a factor. Sounds sound. Nevertheless, Republicans continue to beat the balance-the-budget drum…but only when Democrats are in control. They can do anything they want when they’re in power because…well, because they’re better at that sort of thing.
A longer range taken from a different perspective supports the Democrats’ claim of superior performance. Did you know that since the Civil War, when the Republicans were just beginning as a political party, they have presided over 25 recessions (including the great one of 2007-2008), not to mention the Great Depression. The Democrats own only seven recessions. Again, quite a spread. Starting to get the picture?
All the above may be true, but the myth that Republicans are better custodians of our money persists. Why? That question remains a mystery and a chronic Liberal lament, verbalized here by the late and quotable writer Gore Vidal:
The genius of our ruling class is that it has kept a majority of the people from ever questioning the inequity of a system where most people drudge along, paying heavy taxes for which they get nothing in return.
Spread the word. Destroy the myth.