Any familiar reader of my blog knows I have little tolerance for the mainstream media or Fox News Channel. It wasn't always that way; when I visited my maternal grandfather, a retired grocer, for Christmas break one year (Dad was stationed in West Germany with the family), he would watch all 3 national network evening news (NBC, CBS, ABC) consecutively, a rather quirky option in his Fall River market. We really didn't discuss politics, but he was a rare Massachusetts Republican, while I was more of a liberal Democrat (with pro-life and fiscally conservative views). I did regularly watch the news but with work and my part-time MBA studies in Houston in the early 80's, I somehow caught a syndicated version of Headline News on a local channel in a more convenient time slot. Of course, it became easier to schedule things with my newly purchased VCR. Of course, much has changed since then: multiple 24-hour news channels. news episodes on demand and via podcasts, Youtube clips, etc. I have multiple news alert subscriptions and the like.
I did watch Fox News Channel for a while, but maybe for at most a couple of hours a day (evening newscast, maybe Glenn Beck, O'Reilly, O'Hannity and Colmes, and Red Eye) and special event broadcasting, like election days. I wrote a number of rants on Bill O'Reilly's economic populist rubbish (including Big Oil conspiracies). There was a time around the Tea Party movement where I had hoped that FNC would migrate into a direction more to my pro-liberty preferences; they had signed George Will and John Stossel to add to Andrew Napolitano's presence; Murdoch had acquired the Wall Street Journal. I had perhaps unrealistic expectations of higher quality content, deeper, more articulate, nuanced commentary. But, alas, FNC has a virtual lock on the center-right news media, and I'm not representative of their typical viewer. They did maintain a small cluster of progressive contributors to window dress being "fair and balanced", but forget it if you were expecting an Oxford-style debate. Ironically, although O'Reilly notoriously promoted his "no spin zone", nearly all their news coverage has been replete with predictable soundbites from their regular contributors and guests (including politicians). I wouldn't say I stopped going to the channel altogether, but I think the "jump the shark moment" when they were blatantly promoting Trump's 2016 candidacy, at one point alerting viewers to Trump plane arrivals for campaign events.
Today I might tune in CNN (which provides the context for the post title) during "business hours" (although the progressive "Reality Check" op-eds are enough to get me to change channels). I'll occasionally check FNC, but before long someone like Tomi Lahren comes on and I'm done. (There's something about that woman that annoys me like a teacher's fingernails scratching the blackboard.)
As I write, one year into office, Biden is struggling with a 40.9% job approval, especially on economic numbers, with decades-high inflation offsetting any relevant wage gains; with the omicron wave surging, projected hiring has come in below projections, and we're still millions of jobs shy of the pre-pandemic number, despite all of Biden's record spending, mandates and other policies. Biden, of course, is hyping "record growth", cherry-picking low points in state/local shutdowns (for which "Trump is responsible") and taking credit for businesses rehiring and reopening which isn't really "growth'. Obama used to pull the same nonsense, putting the first 3 and 4 months of job losses on Bush's ledger and taking full credit for the bounce; it is is arbitrary and intellectually dishonest. The fact is we had the slowest recovery in history.
If you do a Google search on Biden, job approval and the economy, you'll find citations, including a CNN post showing the lowest rating since Carter was in office. So the context was a progressive contributor putting her spin on the bad poll by suggesting what I quote in the title.
First, let me point out that in general I agree with the general sentiment that Presidents don't have a lot they can do to directly affect the general economy. There are a lot of factors affecting growth, including but not restricted to global supply chains, logistics and resources (including labor flows), technology (including production capacity and improvements), competition and trade policy, consumer demand, natural disasters, etc.It's not like there's a jobs faucet that got stuck on Trump's watch and Biden had it repaired.
Nor am I taking a partisan stand here. I didn't like Trump's trade and immigration wars, massive spending or deficits, and pushing the Fed to adopt negative rates. There are some things he got right, but he seriously departed from GOP orthodoxy since the Reagan years. So if the troll confounded Trumponomics with GOP policy, I have an issue with that.
Second, it's difficult to argue counterfactuals like the contributor was doing. However, I argue that there are a number of ways that a President can at least foster economic growth policies:
- reduce economic uncertainty. It wasn't helpful that almost immediately Biden was talking about rolling back tax cuts on businesses and tried to impose an OSHA vaccine mandate on large employers which risked current operations. He also supported morally hazardous unemployment supplements making it more lucrative for many people not to work.
- reduce/flatten taxes and regulations. One of the things Trump got right was cutting noncompetitively globally high business taxes, shifting from a worldwide tax system to a more territorial tax system. Government regulations also raise business costs, a disincentive to growth.
- lower spending and cut the deficit. Government competes with business for investor dollars, basically raising the cost of business.
- lower trade and labor barriers. I am not going to go into a detailed defense of the unambiguous compelling case for win-win global trade and comparative advantage. Biden is pushing protectionist Buy American policies. Immigration constraints hurt multiple industries, notably high tech and agriculture.
- reject industrial policy. The idea that political elites can improve on decision making in the private sector of 330M consumers is beyond hubris.
- support sound money. Inflation is a particular regressive tax on lower/middle income consumers. "Beggar thy neighbor" currency wars are counterproductive races which lose the benefits of trade, including exporters to the global market.
While not all Republicans, especially Trump, have been equally committed to this agenda, there is little doubt the GOP is more likely to adopt most of it, and the preponderance of economic evidence supports it. Biden is still trying to hype Obama's policy of "investing" in partisan special interest policies in green energy, education and infrastructure.
