I have to start this “rant” by admitting I’m no economist, but I do pay attention to the economy and I listen to the “experts” – and, of course, they come in all “flavors” – meaning you have to do a little “research” before you decide the credibility of who you’re listening to. And, beyond that, a bit of common sense will help understand what the reality is “we the people” are dealing with as we look into the future. I do have to add, the main economist I listen to is Paul Krugman who gave a basic “course” on economics as a “Master Class” online in which I participated.

Here’s what’s driving my latest frustration. The FACT there is inflated prices right now – largely resulting from the ARP (American Rescue Plan) – inflation which was predicted earlier this year by people like Krugman who claimed it would be “short lived.” MOST of the people I’ve listened to haven’t talked about where this inflation is coming from – although, on Yahoo Finance this morning I FINALLY listened to an economist explain the real cause of this inflation. And, he’s not totally focused on the FACT more people have money to spend due to the ARP, but significantly, the problem is more DEMAND than there is SUPPLY.

I’ve been making this argument since the days Reagan introduced “trickle down economics” back in the early eighties. Right now there is, due to COVID a suppressed supply – and, there are varying reasons for this. Essentially there is a supply chain “bottleneck” which goes beyond the problem of getting goods to market via trucks, rail, etc. Yes, there are container ships sitting off the west coast which are waiting to be off-loaded, but, in addition, there has been a shortage of computer chips for the past year or so and that shortage is expected to last for, maybe, another year. This is the result of COVID and largely originated during the term of “the other guy” – even though “we the people” are not sophisticated enough to make that connection so the reality is the “present guy” gets the blame – especially via the “liberal media.”

We have an “issue” in America where people have become entrenched in a political divide which, obviously, is affecting our economy. For example, there are STILL about 75 to 80 MILLION Americans refusing (for various reasons – some quite legitimate) to get vaccinated for COVID. That, likely, means another “surge” – which will likely be happening globally to an extent. In America, we have the “distinction” of being the WORST country in the world at dealing with COVID and I put the root cause of that at the “feet” of individual 1. (Brazil gives us a “run for our money”) It’s hard NOT to place the “anti-vaxx” population in the so-called “red corner” – directly at his – as I said – “feet.”

Almost EVERY (but, not all) anti-vaxx person I’ve personally talked to is part of individual 1’s CULT and gets their “information” from Fox “news,” “Newsmax,” “OANN,” or worse – if you can get worse than that (and, I’m sure you can in the dregs of the white nationalist hard core “swamp”). Here’s the deal; The “novel” coronavirus is SERIOUS – it’s KILLED over 5 MILLION people worldwide and close to 800,000 in America alone. (Likely much more than that because there are right wing governors who’ve been LYING about those DYING in their states since the beginning – because they didn’t want to make either themselves – with their poor planning – or, individual 1 look bad.) Trust me, when all is said and done, people like Ron DeSantis, Kristi Noem, Gregg Abbot, and other right wing governors are going to be on the wrong side of COVID in the History books.

So, my point is, attempting to emerge from a once in a century pandemic is definitely a driver of the inflation which we’re experiencing at the moment – again, according to people like Krugman it’s “temporary” and it’s “expected.” Once the SUPPLY catches up with the DEMAND it stands to reason the inflation numbers will cool off. And, when looking at the so-called supply “bottleneck,” the supply issue should be receding in the next few months – some say by Christmas.

Another issue in inflation numbers is they are calculated “year over year.” Well, 2020 wasn’t what I’d call a “booming” year regarding the economy. It led to job LOSSES which caused individual 1 to be the FIRST president in recent memory – maybe back to Herbert Hoover – to leave office with a net NEGATIVE job growth – meaning more jobs LOST than GAINED during his four (long) years in office. So, when comparing September or October 2021 to the same months in 2020 it would make sense there would be higher prices – although, that also doesn’t get at the “crux” of the matter.

The other day I was looking at a chart showing today’s inflation numbers broken down into categories. The largest increase, of course, was in gas prices – although, I have to say I’ve gone through the “ups and downs” of gas prices for almost 60 years (I bought gas for 19 cents a gallon in my earlier years). When gas prices get too high people buy less gas – the “supply and demand” thing once again. During the first year of the pandemic oil producers reduced their output because the DEMAND went way down – there were container ships outside of ports where there was little to no demand for the OIL they were transporting. The ships were stuck out at sea. Well, now the opposite is happening and you’d expect that to lead to higher gas prices.

However, it’s not just gas prices at the head of the list of prices pushing up “inflation.” Transportation costs – meaning airline tickets – have gone up because more people are flying – especially for business – and, due to the pandemic, the airline industry was at a “crawl.” That doesn’t affect a large segment of the population directly, but it does count in the inflation “numbers.” Things like “used cars” are up close to 30% because of the chip shortage and the difficulty in buying a new car – and, of course, that would lead to new cars being more expensive. Does that affect me, directly, NO! But, indirectly, it affects the inflation numbers which our ‘liberal media” publishes on a nightly basis causing people who are doing just fine in their households to be feeling as if “the economy is off on the wrong track” in surveys.

Other things on the list I can remember (off the top of my head) would be hotel rooms and rental cars. Of course, for many, this would be traveling for business once again but also people taking trips once again – which would be pushing the cost of these things up compared to 2020 when many hotels were nearly empty and not too many people were looking for rental vehicles – compared to now. Another category which has gone up significantly is appliances. I actually had to purchased a dishwasher earlier this year and it was almost impossible to find the one my wife and I wanted – because the manufacturing facilities overseas were closed down due to COVID. Well, that has caused “pent up” demand for appliances and the supply hasn’t caught up. My point is, the things most people REALLY depend on are rising in price much slower than the numbers you see in our “liberal media” and the 24/7 news cycle doesn’t (can’t?) take the time to actually educate viewers on the details of what they’re reporting. It’s up to “we the people” to do the research – and, most of us don’t – often times, myself included.

Here’s the bottom line to me – over the past year and a half “progressives” have pushed our government to “infuse” stimulus into our economy which has prevented an economic recession caused by the pandemic from becoming MUCH worse. And, this year, for the first time I can remember (OK, in a very long time – I was a young man when Medicare was enacted and, at the time, I had no idea the importance of that legislation) our government has passed two – and soon three – MAJOR bills aimed DIRECTLY at America’s Middle and lower classes which, of course, is going to STIMULATE the economy. As I mentioned above, I’ve been pointing out for years it’s DEMAND which drives the economy, not SUPPLY.

Yes, SUPPLY is important, but without DEMAND what are you going to do with the SUPPLY? It’s important to “marry” the two, but, to me, we’ve seen over 40 years of PROOF that “supply side” economics works only for the wealthy and leaves the working man and woman behind – which is, in my view, the cause of much of the discontent in our society. And, republicans, for years, have used their abuse of cultural “wedge” issues to HIDE the FACT they’ve been pilfering our taxpayers to the tune of TRILLIONS of dollars while suggesting they actually believe the LIES they’ve been pushing in order to get to those dollars. For example, while they’re “screaming” about deficits right now, their 2017 tax scam (which provided TRILLIONS to the “rich”) provided virtually NO stimulus and, recent reports suggest, will increase the deficit by $2.5 TRILLION over a ten year period.

In four years of individual 1′ administration, depending on the source, the national debt increased by between $7 TRILLION and $8 TRILLION – by percentage the “third most” in history – the debt was just under $20 TRILLION when he took office and close to $28 TRILLION when he left. Of course, some of that was the result of COVID, to be fair, but if we’re “fair” with our TWICE IMPEACHED so-called two time popular vote LOSING – disgraced – (ex) president, then shouldn’t we be “fair” with President Biden’s administration. The ARP is mostly funded via “deficit spending” although, as we’re seeing, MOST of the money is going right back into the economy so it’s actually generating economic benefits (which I’m not sophisticated enough to calculate – but, some say, for example, every dollar going into the child tax credit returns $1,75 to the economy – because it’s being spent). The infrastructure bill and the so-called “Build Back Better” bills are “paid for” by increases in taxes on wealthy individuals and corporate and individual “tax cheats.”

Let me explain that last comment – “tax cheats.” The BBB legislation includes money to provide the IRS resources to go after those Americans – largely wealthy Americans – who’ve been routinely CHEATING on their taxes for years. I’ve read a couple books on this topic and republicans have, over the previous few decades managed to strip the IRS of enough resources so they couldn’t go after the high level tax CHEATS because – well, in a word, LAWYERS. Rich people can afford the lawyers poor people can’t – so, in effect, MANY of the “audits” done by the IRS over the previous 30 or so years were aimed at people at the “bottom” instead of people at the “top.” Estimates are our “rich brothers and sisters” are “failing” to pay about $40 to $80 BILLION per year in owed taxes. That, along with the 15% MINIMUM tax on corporations, many which make BILLIONS and pay NOTHING will also raise LOTS of money to help pay for the BBB and the infrastructure bills working their way through Congress. (OK, the infrastructure bill is now law)

So, combined with the FACT the money from both the infrastructure bill and the BBB bill will “hit” the economy gradually means they will have a minimal effect on pushing up inflation, in the short term, and a significant effect in lowering it in the long term – meaning, it’s likely the “Fed” will not need to hurray up their plan for gradual interest rate increases based on the short term inflation data. All of this was to be expected. Of course, had the Biden administration not pushed out the ARP (American Rescue Plan) in March, there would be far less money in the economy, we’d STILL be in recession, and the pandemic would be even WORSE.

That leads me to one of my greatest frustrations with how our 24/7 Cable media works. It’s as if we live in a “what have you done for me lately” world – meaning, how you can manipulate the media plays a more significant role in public perception than what you’re accomplishing, to a large extent. I don’t think many are arguing the democrats are very POOR at messaging while the republicans are viewed as much better – largely because they’re willing to LIE about virtually ANYTHING – as I’ve said here many times it’s “the end justifies the means” philosophy of messaging. That is, LIE through your teeth and look like you mean it theory – or, as they called it back in the Third Reich “The Big Lie Theory.” Why do they do it? Because, obviously, it works.

I’m not suggesting that everything the democrats are doing is perfect, because I’m sure there will be parts of their plan which don’t work as intended. But, here’s the big difference between what they’re doing and what republicans have been pushing on “we the people” for the past 40+ years; The democrats are working from the bottom up and the republicans have been working from the “top down.” We’ve seen the “top down” repeatedly not “trickle down” to the rest of us while income inequality has been steadily INCREASING since the day Reagan took the oath of office. Given time, I believe it will be obvious working from the bottom up will be beneficial to – clearly, those at the “bottom” – but, also to those who’ve been doing OK for the past few years and, eventually, all the way up to the top. Businesses benefit from having customers with money to spend (which is another reason why the minimum wage should go up) and, right now, the challenge is to bring up the supply to meet the demand. This is a far better problem to have than too much supply for the demand. As the saying goes: “A high tide floats all boats.” That should always be the goal!

Final Thought: This all seems almost too obvious to me, but, well, look at where we’ve been. That said, just think about what it means to “bring up the supply.” In essence, it seems to me it means more JOBS. Someone has to create that supply and maybe this increased DEMAND will lead to more businesses producing their SUPPLY in America. Over the previous 40 years I’ve listened to an endless “chorus” of Americans complaining about factories “moving overseas.” Well, if BUYERS don’t have enough money to spend the obvious solution is to get the SUPPLY manufactured where labor is cheaper. Who knows, maybe all of this will lead to more manufacturing jobs produced in America. I remember reading about one of America’s first mass producers, Henry Ford, pointing out the importance of paying his workers enough so they could afford to purchase one of Ford’s autos. That is, if there’s insufficient DEMAND why produce the SUPPLY?

For the sake of our nation, I truly hope the plans of progressives begin to put those things in place where the improvements are most needed (for example, pushing broadband to rural areas) and working class people see improvements in their lives. Who knows, this might even bring down the “temperature” in deep “red” states. For example, Joe Manchin, who’s been vilified by many outside of Washington, hails from maybe the “reddest” state in the union, West Virginia. The legislation democrats are passing (hopefully, he could still be an obstacle) will likely benefit West Virginia as much as it will any other state – certainly MORE than the state (Washington) where I live. West Virginia needs more help and SHOULD get more help.

I still remember Moscow Mitch referring to the stimulus plans as “blue state bailouts” when, in reality, it’s the “blue states” which put MOST of the money into the federal “coffers” – that is much more goes “out” than what comes “in.” For example, Kentucky, McConnell’s home state is one of the four WORST in regard they take out FAR more than they put back in – so, as usual, the words coming from McConnell’s mouth, at the time, were completely FALSE. Well, now, even McConnell is proclaiming the benefits of the infrastructure bill to those in his home state. This is why these republicans are so repulsive to me. Now, McConnell did vote for the infrastructure bill after the so-called “bipartisan” committee negotiated it – but, only because he failed to “kill it.” But, not surprisingly, one republican after another has been claiming credit for the ARP despite the FACT not one of them voted for it. We’re already seeing this “history” repeating itself on the new legislation.

That being said, I hope the bill work and it’s up to the democrats to figure out how to message their agenda to “we the people” in a way to PREVENT individual 1 from ever “sniffing” a return to the “White House” again. Which leads me to where I’ll end this particular “rant.” Clearly, republicans FEAR these democratic initiatives will prove successful and, in anticipation that President Biden will not run for re-election in 2024 we’re already (as I predicted after the election of 2020) seeing the “Hillary Clinton style attacks” on Kamala Harris. Republicans are working overtime to convince as many Americans as they can that VP Harris is – well, I guess, and “ambitious woman” – or, who knows what. They’re doing Birtherism 2.0, and anything else they think might “stick.” Have to give them credit, they’re always thinking ahead. Stay tuned….