Category: Politics

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Trump’s Election: The Winners and Losers

trump-2The election is over, and the people have spoken. Donald Trump will be the next President of the United States. For years, political pundits and academicians will discuss the outcome and the possible reasons for the unexpected results. At this time, no one knows how President Trump will govern. Presumably, he will attempt to fulfill the promises that he made during the campaign. If so, who are the likely Winners and Losers as a consequence of the Republican sweep of the Presidency, the Senate, and the House of Representatives?
 
Here are my initial thoughts:

WINNERS

The American Democracy

Despite claims of voter fraud and election fixes by some as well as concerns about the peaceful transfer of power from one Presidency to another, it is clear that the transition will be peaceful. Candidate Clinton conceded the election and offered to help the new President in any way she could. President Obama has invited the President-to-be to the White House to begin the plans for the upcoming transition. Unlike other countries, most Americans will accept the new President and hope that the future will be better for all.

The UltraRight

Having been ignored or chastised by the public and political parties generally, the election of Donald Trump has returned the most extreme element of the Republican Party to power. As a consequence, Federal regulations will be severely cut back, and power will be restored to State legislatures. In many states, this means that recent laws expanding the rights of minorities will be rolled back including same-sex marriage, a return to racial profiling, and the expansion of Christian religious beliefs in the everyday lives of Americans.

NRA, Gun Owners & Dealers

The NRA was the first major organization to endorse Trump and noted the day after the election that “He [Trump] will certainly remember who helped propel him to office and the promises he made to respect our right to bear arms.” As a consequence, efforts to expand laws to reduce the ownership and carry of guns of all types will be unsuccessful. Federal and State legislature will repeal existing laws restricting the sale of guns, and expand open-carry laws.

Soviet Union

Russian President Vladimir Putin quickly announced his support for a Trump Presidency and the possibility of new Russian-American relations. Trump had previously recognized Putin as “ strong leader – stronger than our President.” He has also indicated his support of Russia’ absorption of the Crimea in a July 31, 2016, interview with ABC’s George Stephanopoulos with his statement that “The people of Crimea, from what I heard, would rather be with Russia than where they were.”

The Top 1% of Tax Payers

According to studies by the Citizens for Tax Justice, Trump’s tax plan will deliver “massive tax breaks to the wealthiest Americans and a pittance to the poorest.” The Tax Policy Center projects that “the largest benefits (47% of all cuts in 2017 going to the top 1%) would go to the highest income households.” The Tax Foundation concurs, projecting that the top 1% will receive an increase ranging from 10.2% to 16% while the average taxpayer would get an increase of less than 1%.

Coal and Oil Industries

According to an article in the Wall Street Journal, a Tump victory means eased regulations, lifting limits on mining and drilling on federal lands, and the promotion of energy-related infrastructure including oil and gas pipelines. He also promised to repeal regulations regarding the production and use of coal, including environmental regulations.

White Conservative Evangelicals

Despite Trump’s marital history and questionable statements about women, white evangelicals turned out in greater numbers than for Romney, McCain, or Romney in recent elections. In a meeting January 24, 2016, in Sioux Center, Iowa, Trump promised with evangelicals, “I am a true believer. . . When I win, the war on Christianity stops! . . . If I’m there [as President” ], you’re going to have plenty of power. You don’t need anyone else, you’re going to have someone representing you very, very well, remember that.”

LOSERS

Partisan Cooperation

Despite calls for an end to political deadlock and return to civility, Trump promised to appoint a special prosecutor to “put Hillary in jail,” repeatedly labeled his opponent “Crooked Hillary,” and encouraged his supporters’ chants to “Lock her up!” His public pronouncements – if implemented – will widen the gap between neighbors, families, and friends with opposing political views.

President Barak Obama

Trump, with the assistance of a Republican Senate and House, has promised to roll back Obama’s Executive Orders, renege on the Iran Nuclear Agreement, cancel the Paris Agreement to address climate change, and halt participation in the TransPacific Partnership (TPP). He has also promised to repeal The Accountable Care Act, President Obama’s most noteworthy accomplishment.

House Speaker Paul Ryan

With the election of Trump, he replaces House Speaker Paul Ryan as the country’s #1 Republican. Also, Trump and his supporters are likely to hold Ryan accountable for his failure to fully endorse the President-to-be during the election cycle. Finally, many of Trump’s positions during the campaign are contrary to positions the Republican Establishment has carefully developed under Ryan’s leadership.

Republican Establishment

Trump’s unorthodox campaign focused upon a rigged system that disadvantages the average American. His targets included the Republican leadership and those members who failed to support him or, in many cases, actively campaigned against his election. His self-identified penchant for “counter-punching” does not bode well for cooperation among the Party elite, the elected Congressional members, and his Executive Branch.

Federal Bureau of Investigation

Director James Comey’s ill-advised insertion into Presidential politics eleven days before election (despite acknowledging that there was no new evidence regarding Clinton’s emails0 has significantly reduced the Bureau’s reputation for thoroughness and professionalism. His latest act followed confusing testimony regarding Clinton’s culpability, but not criminality in the in the initial investigation during the campaign. The subsequent exposure of deep division within the organization suggests significant changes will occur in the coming months.

NATO

During the campaign, Trump questioned the value of the North American Treaty Organization, a 28-nation alliance established in 1949. In an interview with the New York Times in July 2016, he stated that he would decide to honor the terms of the pact only after reviewing whether they had fulfilled their obligations to us, i.e, paid for their defense. According to Trump, “We are spending a fortune on military in order to lose $800 billion. That doesn’t sound very smart to me.”

Immigrants

Whether a Syrian refugee or an illegal from Mexico, Trump has shown an antipathy to immigrants. President-to-be Trump has repeatedly promised to build a wall between the borders of the United States and Mexico, deport millions of illegals peaceably residing in this country for years, and reject Muslim refugees from the war territories in the Middle East.

Free Trade and American Consumers

Trump’s promise to restore American jobs by renegotiation of existing trade deals and imposing penalties on imported goods will result in higher prices for goods for all Americans, whether in the form of higher tariffs or increased labor costs.

Science and Environment

As Trump said early in his campaign, “I love the poorly educated. We’re the smartest people, we’re the most loyal people.” He distrusts science, tweeting on November 6, 2012, that “The concept of global warming was created by the Chinese in order to make U.S. Manufacturing non-competitive. Vice President-to-be Mike Pence has questioned the validity of evolution and proposed the teaching of creationism – intelligent design – in public schools.

Final Word

Undoubtedly, others may conclude a different list of winners and losers. One of the contentious elements of the campaign was President-to-be Trump’s deplorable statements about women in conversation with entertainer Billy Bush. This might lead some to conclude that women are one of the preeminent losers of the election. However, Mr. Trump;s employment of women in key executive positions in his companies suggests his position is evolving. As a consequence, I have deferred on including women on this list.
 
When discussing Trump’s election with a staunch Republican friend this morning, he assured me that President Trump’s actions would not reflect Candidate Trump’s promises. According to him, Trump will not seek to prosecute Clinton, build a border wall, or implement any of his more extreme campaign promises that appealed to his core supporters. He will, instead, implement traditional Republican policies following the counsel of such luminaries as Speaker Ryan, Senate Majority Leader McConnell, former Mayor of New York Rudy Giuliani, and Governor Chris Christie.
 
Which Trump will we see in the Presidency? I hope for all our sakes he is a uniter, not a divider, even if it means he reneges on his campaign promises.

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How We Can Create and Keep Manufacturing Jobs in America

manufacturing-factory-worker-918x516The loss of American jobs has become a potent political issue. Politicians promise to reverse the trend of offshoring and to restore American workers to their previous position as the premier workforce in the world. Many tout new reshoring initiatives, claiming that jobs will return as wage differentials shrink, the quality of foreign goods falls, and shipping costs increase. Others propose new punitive legislation with penalties for moving jobs to foreign countries while erecting trade barriers to ensure that domestic products can compete with lower-priced foreign goods.
 
Unfortunately, their promises are empty and fail to consider the underlying causes of offshoring, the probable consequences of trade barriers, or the increased pace of technology. In efforts to gain public favor, existing and wannabe office-holders vow to turn back the clock and return American manufacturing to its heyday in the 1950s. Simple, quick fixes for public consumption ignore the relentless expansion of globalization and the economic interdependence of world economies.
Manufacturing’s Role in the American Economy
 
According to the Center for American Progress, manufacturing is critical to the American economy, and its success or failure affects the economy as a whole, our national security, and the well-being of all Americans. In his book “Were You Born on the Wrong Continent?,” Thomas Geoghegan goes further, claiming without a strong industrial base, democracy dies.
 
According to Manufacturing.net, “Manufacturing was the primary reason for post-World War II growth of the middle class, and they are still inextricably linked today.” American manufacturing provided middle-class workers good paying jobs, and their factories were the main employers in American cities throughout the northeastern United States.
 
The area once referred to as the “Manufacturing Belt” or (“Factory Belt”) is now known as the “Rust Belt,” as job losses significantly impacted cities such as Detroit, Gary, Youngstown, Buffalo, and Toledo. Even companies whose names are synonymous with the towns and cities where they began (such as Hershey, Pennsylvania, and Kohler, Wisconsin) have offshored manufacturing jobs to the detriment of their communities. The collapse of the sector increased unemployment drastically in the forsaken communities, leading to urban decay, deteriorated services, and ghettos.
 
Read more . . .

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How to Fix the United States’ Debt Problems & Reduce Federal Deficits

federal-debt-18 trillionAccording to projections by the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), America will continue to spend more than it receives in revenues from 2016 to 2026, and perhaps beyond. The budget deficit is projected to be slightly below 3% of gross domestic product (GDP) through 2018, then rise to 4.9% by 2026.
 
If the CBO projections are accurate, the federal debt will grow another $9.4 trillion by the end of the 10-year period, with potentially dire consequences for the country. According to the authors of the report, “The likelihood of a fiscal crisis in the United States would increase. There would be a greater risk that investors would be unwilling to finance the government’s borrowing needs unless they were compensated with very high interest rates; if that happened, interest rates on the federal debt would rise suddenly and sharply.”
 
Higher interest rates—averaging 2.3% in 2014 and 2015, as reported by TreasuryDirect—on an increasing amount of debt are likely to cause a “crowding out” effect, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. As the Federal Government borrows more money to pay its bills, there is less capital available for the private sector.
 
Many believe that the CBO’s concern is understated. In his testimony before the United States Senate Budget Committee February 25, 2015, economist Dr. Laurence J. Kotlikoff of Boston University bluntly stated, “Our country is broke. It’s not broke in 75 years or 50 years or 25 years or 10 years. It’s broke today. Indeed, it may well be in worse fiscal shape than any developed country, including Greece.” Kotlikoff claims that Congress has “cooked the books” for years, and that the difference between the present value of all projected future government expenditures less the present value of all projected future receipts was actually $210 trillion in 2014, more than 16 times the actual reported debt.
 
Whether or not economists agree on the appropriate level of the federal debt, there is agreement that the only way to reduce annual deficits and pay down the debt is for the government to Collect more than it spends – an unlikely (if not impossible) result in today’s political atmosphere. Only six times between 1960 and 2015 has the Federal Government spent less than it collected, according to the Office of Management and Budget. Most recently, in 2015, the Federal Government collected $3.25 trillion in taxes, almost 60% from income taxes, while spending $3.69 trillion. As a result, the budget deficit of $439 billion—the lowest deficit since 2008—was added to the federal debt.
 

The Myth of Economic Growth as a Solution

Politicians regularly suggest that the deficit problem can be resolved as the economy improves because revenues through taxes naturally increase as incomes rise through stronger growth. Such thinking encourages postponing actions that are politically unpopular, such as raising taxes or cutting popular programs.
 
Hoping that economic growth can solve America’s problems is likely futile for the following reasons:
 
GDP Growth Is Projected to Be Lower Than in the Past. According to the CBO’s Budget and Economic Data, annual growth averaged 3.2% to 3.3% from 1974 to 2001, 2.7% from 2002 to 2007, and 1.4% from 2008 to 2015. While the economy is recovering, the CBO projects average annual growth from 2016 to 2025 at 2.0%, well below the average prior to 2008.
 
Widening Income Disparity Threatens Economic Growth. The trickle-down theory was discredited by a 2015 International Monetary Fund report, which indicated that when the rich get richer, no others benefit and growth slows. The data from more than 150 nations suggests that when the richest 20% of a society increases their income by 1%, the annual rate of GDP growth shrinks by nearly 0.1% within five years.
 
Costs for the Major Entitlement Programs Will Rise Sharply. The aging population, rising healthcare costs per person, and increased costs of the Affordable Care Act are likely to boost federal spending for Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid if current laws remain unchanged. As Kotlikoff testified, the estimated 76 million members of the Baby Boomer generation are already entering a period where each recipient will Collect “$40,000 in Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid benefits each year.” As a consequence, the largest group of people to put money into the system – the Boomers – will begin taking it out. Left unchanged, Social Security will begin using its surplus funds to pay benefits in 2017 and deplete reserves by 2034.
 
Interest Costs on Federal Debt Will Triple in the Next 10 Years. According to CBO projections, net interest costs for the federal debt are projected to more than triple from $223 billion in 2015 to $772 billion in 2025.
Projections Do Not Include the Costs of New Wars for Defense Against Terrorism. The Watson Institute of Brown University estimates the costs to date of the wars in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iraq at $4.4 trillion, all of which were funded by borrowing. Some analysts estimate the costs of the three wars even higher. The cost of future defense is unknown, but likely to be as high as – if not higher than – past wars.
 
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Turning Point – Free Trade or Protectionism

free tradeThe debate about free trade versus protective tariffs (taxes) has raged for centuries. However, it has become especially virulent as industrialized countries lose an increasing amount of jobs to emerging nations. Free traders, worried about the possibility of new tariffs to protect native industries, predict a trade apocalypse. Reported by TIME, Robert Zoellick, president of the World Bank, claimed, “If we start to trigger a round of protectionism, as you saw in the 1930s, it could deepen the world crisis.”
 
Proponents of free trade – including many economists – claim that the benefits of lower prices far outweigh the costs of lower incomes and displaced workers. Professor of Economics Alan Binder, writing in the Library of Economics and Liberty, claims that a country’s wage level depends not upon its trade policy, but its productivity: “As long as American workers remain more skilled and better educated, work with more capital, and use superior technology, they will continue to earn higher wages than their Chinese counterparts.”
 
Opponents of free trade disagree. Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont has consistently voted against trade agreements, including the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). He argues that trade agreements have encouraged corporations that seek low-income labor and fewer regulations to close factories and ship jobs overseas. According to the senator on Fox News, “Over the years, we [America] have lost millions of decent-paying jobs. These trade agreements have forced wages down in America so the average worker in America today is working longer hours for lower wages.”
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Understanding the history of tariffs and free trade, especially in the United States, is necessary to evaluate the effects of NAFTA and the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). Two other major trade agreements are also being discussed – The Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) and the China Bilateral Investment Treaty (BIT) – which could have global ramifications as well.

Tariffs and Free Trade in the 20th Century

By the end of World War I, advocates of high tariffs recognized that tariffs weren’t the most important source of government revenues and so adopted an alternative argument. There was the widespread belief that tariffs benefited the wealthy while raising the cost of goods for other Americans. As a consequence, protectionists justified tariffs primarily as a way to promote employment for citizens of their country. This argument coincided with a growing concern that inexpensive foreign goods would destroy domestic manufacturers and lead to widespread unemployment.
 
After World War I, economic nationalism and protectionism dominated world trade with countries creating new taxes on foreign goods to protect native industries and maintain full employment of their citizens. As the global economy shrank, countries retreated behind the new tariffs and trade blocks to protect native industries until after World War II.
 
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