Yves here. This post is yet another reader critical thinking exercise. We have pointed out repeatedly that Congress has abdicated responsibility for management of the economy, preferring to punt it to the Fed. Admittedly legislative timetables can make it difficult to respond in a timely manner (although the Covid emergency measures are a counter-example). But there’s no willingness even to consider giving preference to counter-cyclical programs or excess profits taxes. Of course, those tend to help the poors at the expense of the rich. Can’t have that!
To kick off reader discussion, the article fails to consider where both parties are all on board with profiteering, namely in the arms industry and health care, or where price gouging is the result of Federal subsidies and benefits a core Democratic party constituency (student loans’ impact on higher education costs). And is either party doing much about how food industry middlemen have long made out like bandits, to the detriment of both farmers and consumers? Yes, Biden did appoint Lina Kahn at the FTC, but her priority seems to be to create a body of case law with high profile targets that can then hopefully be deployed more broadly. While that should yield benefits if she can make enough progress, that isn’t much help to budget-strapped households.
By Tiffany Muller, President of End Citizens United, which is dedicated to getting Big Money out of politics and fixing the rigged system in Washington, D.C. so the government works for all Americans. Originally published at Common Dreams
The economy remains a top issue in the minds of Americans in 2024. As inflation rates drop across the country and supply chains stabilize post-pandemic, voters are rightfully angry that they’re continuing to make tough decisions every day, like whether to put food on the table or pay rent, while corporations continue hiking up prices to pad their own pockets.
While polls suggest economic issues present an advantage for Republicans, the current dynamic of economic frustration provides Democrats a real opportunity to go on offense and hold Republicans accountable for corporate price gouging.
Because while Americans struggle with these high prices, companies and CEOs brag about record-high profits, and their sticker prices remain inflated.
This is by careful design—a practice called greedflation.
Corporations are bucking the trends and inflating prices to boost their profits. According to a recent report, corporate profits accounted for over half of inflation during last year’s second and third quarters. The same report found that prices for consumers rose by 3.4 percent while input costs for producers increased by just 1 percent.
These corporations don’t care about working families and they never will. The rich continue to get richer while everyday families struggle to afford their basic necessities. And Americans know this. According to recent Navigator Research polling, four in five Americans blame corporations being greedy and raising prices to make record profits as a cause of inflation, including three in five who believe that it is a “major” cause of inflation – a 15-point increase since January 2022.
But corporations are not acting alone. Flying largely under the radar is how greedflation has been enabled by the Republican politicians in Congress who have been bought and paid for by corporate PACs, dark money, and well-connected lobbyists.
For example, oil and gas companies accounted for half of all corporate contributions over $1 million to outside groups in the 2020 cycle––with every contribution going to GOP super PACs and dark money groups. And while oil and gas companies saw record profits in 2022, they spent $124 million on lobbyists.
Across industries, from retail to Big Oil, corporate PACs are shelling out big dollars to fund Republicans—corporate PACs spent $150 million last election cycle alone. Not surprisingly, the corporate PACs doling out millions are the same corporations deliberately relying on greedflation to keep their profits high and consumers’ wallets tight.
While Democrats have been hard at work to combat this profiteering—from President Biden cracking down on junk fees, Senator Elizabeth Warren’s work on shrinkflation, and Senator Bob Casey holding corporations accountable for greedflation—it’s time to go on offense.
Alongside democracy, the economy continues to be a top priority for voters. Democrats must seize this opportunity to expose Republicans’ for turning their backs on Americans in favor of protecting their corporate donors’ pockets.
In addition to running in these crucial districts and states, Democrats must take action against bankrolled Republicans in office. This means calling out their local leaders and their party bosses, like Minority Senate Leader Mitch McConnell and Majority House Leader Steve Scalise, for accepting tens of millions of dollars in corporate PAC contributions to vote against and block legislation that cracks down on greedflation and profiteering—like the Inflation Reduction Act.
The GOP has never seen a problem that can’t be solved by a corporate tax break and staunchly opposes bills to hold corporations accountable and bring down costs for working families, like the Big Oil Windfall Profits Tax Act and the Price Gouging Prevention Act.
And it’s no coincidence that the first major bill passed by the Republican-controlled House this Congress was a handout to the Big Oil industry and its deregulatory agenda.
Just in case you needed a reminder of where the GOP’s priorities lie: Republicans will never stand against their corporate donors.
To win in November, Democrats must make the contrast clear that on the economy, it’s Republicans who are doing the bidding of their corporate donors and fueling greedflation.
Only then will we be able to make real change—both in our policies and in our wallets
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Law, medical care war and government employee unions seem to be areas that contribute to inflation although the taxpayer might not see it since it is just added to the deficit. Massive immigration is another driver since rents will go up and health care especially for children will go up and education costs will increase. The taxes these groups pay are minimal. We have military Keynesism and migrant Keynesism and legal and medical Keynesism with similary economic consequences. These are not bad things but they inject government money into the economy. The author seems to focus primarily on industries that contribute to republicans…..especially the resource extractions industries which benefit from looser environmental protections. At least these industries are self financing and they have to pay the bribery money to the politicians…..as opposed to the taxpayers in the future.
Your “Massive immigration” comment blames the victims. Between 1798 and 1994 the US was responsible for 41 changes of government south of its borders–even more such changes lately, too. This creates a constant stream of military and political refugees.
Even worse are the economic attacks. One might suppose shipping a bunch of subsidized Iowa corn to Mexico, as permitted by NAFTA, would at least impair Mexican corn farmers’ income–and that treaty even acknowledges that, since it includes a bailout for the big farmers. The little, subsistence corn farmers growing the obscure varieties of corn–you know, the ones keeping the disease-resistance and diversity of the corn genome alive–they went bankrupt and flocked to “El Norte” to mow lawns and paint houses rather than starve.
In the wake of NAFTA, Mexican real, median income declined 34% (says Ravi Batra in Greenspan’s Fraud). Such a decline in the US happened last in the Great Depression. Just think of those immigrants as late Okies, who we’ll then blame for our problems, cage, and separate from their families.
How about we stop attacking the rest of the world instead?
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=omBh
August 4, 2014
Real per capita Gross Domestic Product for Mexico as a percent of Real per capita Gross Domestic Product for United States & Exports of Goods and Services by Mexico as a percent of Gross Domestic Product, 1992-2022
(Indexed to 1992)
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=omBq
August 4, 2014
Real per capita Gross Domestic Product for Mexico as a percent of Real per capita Gross Domestic Product for United States & Exports of Goods and Services by Mexico as a percent of Gross Domestic Product, 1992-2022
(Indexed to 1992)
Since NAFTA, Mexican per capita GDP growth has lagged almost every country in Latin America as well as lagging the US and Canada:
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=1cozq
August 4, 2014
Real per capita Gross Domestic Product for Brazil, Argentina, Chile and Mexico, 1992-2022
(Percent change)
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=1cozx
August 4, 2014
Real per capita Gross Domestic Product for Brazil, Argentina, Chile and Mexico, 1992-2022
(Indexed to 1992)
But Adam, blaming victims and the powerless, and not looking behind the curtain is part of American Culture. I think they call it “kissing up, kicking down”. Piss on the powerless, worship the oligarchy. It’s fun and easy, no critical thinking required.
It would be instructive to find a way to categorize those crossing our border without benefit of
clergydocumentation.1. Political or persecution refugee / asylum seeker. Thanks, Nuland et al.
2. Economic refugee, due to ruined local or national economy. Thanks, Hillary et al.
3. Economic opportunist, looking for a better life and advertised handouts. Thanks, Joe for that surge.
4. Political arrival, with some potentially nefarious intent.
5. Reunite with family.
6. Some or all of the above.
7. Other?
In any event, there are thousands all over the world willing to make the trek at great personal and financial cost.
>>>Even worse are the economic attacks.
This is why even as anti-immigration as a I am, I just cannot quite get mad at those south of the border who come here to the United States. They should not be here, but for too many, it is that or die.
This is just risible: “
What does it even mean? Here are the typical Dem weasel words: “Cracking down, work on, holding accountable” empty rhetoric, which is all the Democrats have done since the 1960s. There are no executive orders, no passed bills, nothing. And the comments on the original post at Common Dreams are having none of it.
The Simpsons meme never gets old.
https://www.reddit.com/r/TheSimpsons/comments/irdgp4/a_little_bipartisan_humor_from_the_simpsons/
Interest rates? Like the average American gives a crap about the fed. How about grocery prices which are astronomical and are never coming down on a per unit price.
All Trump has to do is loop this speech of Biden’s over and over again.
“A president navigates how to ask for painful sacrifices from Americans for Ukraine”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/03/09/biden-sacrifices-ukraine/
Food, fuel, fertilizer–all banned from our shores so that his donors can make more from what they sell to us.
Common Dreams would do well to stop being Democratic party cheerleaders. They present good findings and do it in nice, succinct articles, but they act like stuff like Bernie Sanders sending an angry letter to a company is real progress for the working class.
>To win in November, Democrats must make the contrast clear that on the economy, it’s Republicans who are doing the bidding of their corporate donors and fueling greedflation.
Lol. As if Democrats do not answer to their corporate owners. From OpenSecrets:
https://www.opensecrets.org/industries/summary?cycle=2024&ind=F
https://www.opensecrets.org/industries/summary?cycle=2024&ind=B
https://www.opensecrets.org/industries/summary?cycle=2024&ind=H
Congress is institutionally unwilling and unable to self-regulate. They benefit from the overt and covert funding, perquisites and those National Committees, all while hiding their actions from voters and misdirecting what used to be called the press.
Getting rid of Mitch McTurtle is a tiny step in the right direction. Now if only several more would follow, starting with those Permanent
ObfuscationSubcommittees.I am given to understand that changing the direction of an economy is like trying to change course for one of those super tankers. It takes a lot of time which the Democrats no longer have. So the Democrats can only try to do a heavy pr job to make voters think that they are doing a great job. But they are doing that already with the media reporting that this is the best economy ever in spite of all the evidence of high inflation and the like. Nobody believes them anymore. Trying to tell voters that they hold Republicans accountable for corporate price gouging and the like is not going to cut it as it has been the Democrats in charge of the country the past three years. Bit too late to blame the previous administration. And there is no way that Biden is going to crack down on corporation price gouging as he will be needing those corporation’s donations over the coming nine months. He needs them so – too little and too late.
Granted, turning a supertanker takes time but it also requires steering inputs from the start which the Democratic Party (Pelosi, Schumer, et. al.) were and are utterly unwilling to do.
My pet peeve example, changing either the number of seats on the “supreme” court or changing how it operates or both. All of those “steering inputs” were shot down by the “leadership” from the very beginning.
Given how bad things are, it looks like the Dems already went on the offensive, and the economy (at least for regular people) is losing. (I’m here all week, folks.)
The author of this piece is delusional. The Dems shrunk medicaid after Republicans expanded it. Recent history tells me Republicans are ever so slightly more likely to throw me a crumb than the Dems.
Ah, yes, the Democrats, friends of the workingman.
Intuition and experience already falsify the premise, that there is a contrast between Dems and Repubs on ‘the economy’. Just for fun, then, let’s use a simplified propositional logic to look at the last two sentences.
“To win in November, Democrats must make the contrast clear that on the economy, it’s Republicans who are doing the bidding of their corporate donors and fueling greedflation. Only then will we be able to make real change—both in our policies and in our wallets”
Another way of organizing these propositions would be “we will be able to make real change only if democrats win in November by making clear that republicans do the bidding of their corporate donors”
D = democrats must make the contrast clear on the economy
R = republicans do the bidding of their corporate donors
RC = only then will we be able to make real change
This could be expressed as (D*R)>RC
We’re granting R, so the exercise doesn’t fall apart.
The material biconditional “only if” makes it kind of easy (and is telling). If democrats don’t make the contrast clear, and they don’t win, then we will not be able to make real change. If they make it clear, and they win, we will be able to make real change.
As a logical chain, it shows the mental traps democrats set for themselves, and the voters, donors, and strategists they are trying to mobilize.
Well, that was fun. Let’s step out of the truth tables and into the real world. The contrast is anything but clear between the corporate sponsorship of the Republicans vs. that of the Democrats. Sometimes different sectors of the haute bourgeoisie prefer the patronage of one party over the other. The tech oligopolies, for example, seem to tend to give their money to the Dems, like the Bankman-Frieds. Then there are the areas of overlap, like Wall Street. I don’t know this, but I would suspect the agriculture oligopoly gives generously to both parties as well.
Another aspect of this article which deserves some attention: why the focus on “contrast”? The three examples the author cites to explain to us that the Dems are all basically the reincarnation of Clarrence Darrow combined with Ralph Nader aside, this reads like its intended audience is marketing strategists. Position yourself as reformers, except of course when you’re at the fundraiser.
In the end, who cares? PMC Dems may be able to convince themselves that they are in the game for “real change”, but they can’t fool me. For “real change” within a political duopoly, one of the parties would have to have smart, critical, caring people in it. Intelligent, critical, caring people do not join the democrats; they run up against the system of filters which specifically weeds out those who possess all of those traits at once (you might be smart but uncaring and still succeed, or unintelligent and caring, or uncritical and caring – many are), leaving as a remainder people who are living expressions of the party orthodoxy, or can simply repeat it, and reap the benefits.
“… As inflation rates drop across the country and supply chains stabilize post-pandemic, voters are rightfully angry that they’re continuing to make tough decisions every day, like whether to put food on the table or pay rent, while corporations continue hiking up prices to pad their own pockets…”
Flagging yet another piece that centers economic woes around the pandemic. It makes any of the mostly BS metrics look good when comparing it to the sporadic and sometimes permanent shut-downs of 2020.
This ignores the longterm economic rot for working people: the long-term trend of falling worker participation, the long-term trend in the rising cost of living, the long-term trend of rising wealth inequality (especially accelerating during bubble pumping low interest rates for the well-connected).
And it’s kind of a stretch to say supply chains are “stabilizing.” I dunno…maybe they are trying to avoid using the phrase “normalizing.”
All in all, to hell with the Democrats and the Repiblicans.
They’ve done nothing but serve their super wealthy donors.
I saw a great cartoon in the Xitter, where a trolley is running over an endless line of helpless peeps tied to the tracks, and a guy with a lever.
Caption ” If you pull the lever, you can change the color of the trolley from Red to Blue!”
Keyboard damage ensued.
By Tiffany Muller, President of End Citizens United, which is dedicated to getting Big Money out of politics and fixing the rigged system in Washington, D.C. so the government works for all Americans. Originally published at Common Dreams
In her position as described in above introduction – I agree.
She has done an incredible disservice in the bulk of article where she goes partisan in direct conflict to her title “works for all Americans”
What a joke to play with important issues that have come about directly by the actions of BOTH parties with numerous examples of legislation, going on for decades, favoring the FIRE sector and financial ‘doing gods work’ parasites. What a way to derail good work.
Tiffany Muller – what were you thinking – are you trying to single handedly deliberately sink End Citizens United, which is dedicated to getting Big Money out of politics and fixing the rigged system in Washington, D.C. so the government works for all Americans
It sure looks like it to me
Good to read this and know Nancy Pelosi is actually a Republican. \ SARC
Come on, pull the other leg…While you are at it, let us know the Democrats are always “fighting for” this, that or access to the other.
In my head, whenever someone mentions the (US) economy, I hear “the rent is too damn high” instead. Even in work meetings.
not a mention of big pharma inflation – an industry much larger than oil and gas, and with massive governmental subsidies that big oil can only dream about. Hmmm. I wonder why.
I never heard of someone going bankrupt due to high gas prices at the pump.
Could it have anything to do with all the lobbying dollars?
We must cut the war profiteering, which is a democrat jobs/profit program, using the arms makers for genocide seems fair.
8 years of Obama! Democrats have not been good for the low-middle class workers.
Unless they can work for Lockheed!
Notice that military spending has now reached the level of $1,022 trillion yearly:
https://apps.bea.gov/iTable/?reqid=19&step=2&isuri=1&categories=survey#eyJhcHBpZCI6MTksInN0ZXBzIjpbMSwyLDNdLCJkYXRhIjpbWyJjYXRlZ29yaWVzIiwiU3VydmV5Il0sWyJOSVBBX1RhYmxlX0xpc3QiLCI1Il1dfQ==
February 28, 2024
Defense spending was 56.2% of federal government consumption and investment in October through December 2023 *
$1,022.1 / $1,820.1 = 56.2%
Defense spending was 21.0% of all government consumption and investment in October through December 2023
$1,022.1 / $4,866.5 = 21.0%
Defense spending was 3.7% of Gross Domestic Product in October through December 2023
$1,022.1 / $27,944.6 = 3.7%
* Billions of dollars
Another good stat is if we add up the official DoD budget and add up all the military aid packages, handouts and giveaways to Israel, Ukraine, etc. then add in the special “appropriations” that are not part of the DoD budget it represent well over half of federal discretionary spending (not including SS, Medicare…) Even just the DoD budget alone, it represents over half.
https://www.nationalpriorities.org/blog/2023/05/31/parity-schmarity-military-big-winner-fy-2024-budget-deal/
And we see prize-winning “economists” like ol’ Kruggie say there is no such thing as the MIC, and that the US should spend more on “defense”.
https://apps.bea.gov/iTable/?reqid=19&step=2&isuri=1&categories=survey#eyJhcHBpZCI6MTksInN0ZXBzIjpbMSwyLDNdLCJkYXRhIjpbWyJjYXRlZ29yaWVzIiwiU3VydmV5Il0sWyJOSVBBX1RhYmxlX0xpc3QiLCI1Il1dfQ==
February 28, 2024
Defense spending was 56.2% of federal government consumption and investment in October through December 2023 *
$1,022.1 / $1,820.1 = 56.2%
* Billions of dollars
Lockheed Martin…didn’t Dirty Dick Cheney’s wife work for them? Cheney was part of the Bush Jr. regime (R). The MICIMATT is fully bipartisan as u, not just the Ds.
We live in a de-facto one-party state (oligarchy)
And little to no discussion of competition. If Team Blue No Matter Who hadn’t been on such a tear to approve any and all mergers for the last three decades we might have enough competition to provide options for these services and products. If The Smartest People Ever!(tm) hadn’t been so concerned with the stock market, we might have some domestic industry to stand against what China and others are bringing to the world market. If people like Biden actually supported unions, we could talk about a national industrial policy, and not have to listen to sick individuals like Vicky Nuland say that sending money for war crimes supports domestic manufacturing. We need to kill the monopolies, the cronyism, and the surveillance of American citizens to have an economy that works for people. The Blue adjacent people like Nina Turner who speak to those concerns are silenced are sidelined. The Democrats in power are against all of those goals. Until they admit their mistakes and start doing something about the problems they created we won’t see any progress. I don’t think the kind of people who write these articles have any interest in that.
how can anyone in their right mind, think the democrats are going to change something, that they themselves created?
offshore tax havens are a direct result of free trade: the pathology of free trade is being exposed
Today’s global rich are increasingly stateless, detaching their money from nation states and conventional representations of ownership to hide and preserve it. A global oligarchy is growing — and it does not bode well for everyone else and the planet.
free trade enables the plundering of the wealth of nations, especially hurting the world’s most poor and vulnerable populations. It allows wealthy individuals and corporations to dodge and evade their tax responsibilities, shifting obligations onto those with fewer resources. It empowers criminals, deadbeats, and kleptocrats
in 1983 there were only 15 billionaires in the u.s.a., under bill clintons free trade, billionaires have ballooned into more than 615, and under free trade, this is happening globally
https://www.bostonglobe.com/2021/04/01/magazine/costs-secretive-wealth-defense-industry-shell-companies-offshore-tax-havens-empty-luxury-condos/
…
so maybe a few wealthy people who are not globally connected might be taxed, but they to will go offshore pronto, once that happens. so the tax burden will continue to fall onto the victims of free trade, the masses.
can’t wait to see some clintonite propose a VAT tax.
I think that we need to bring back the WWF meme that Yves introduced us to during the Obama years: Kayfabe. “End Citizens United” is the tell here. Money is speech. I spent decades as an activist in a public employee labor organization, and when we voluntarily pooled our money together in a PAC and started sprinkling it around we got people’s attention, let me assure you!
It was Hopey-Changey Kenyan Jesus who “fought” the 8-1 plurality of justices in Citizens United v. FEC who agreed that radical transparency enabled by modern technology was the answer to money in politics. Hopey-Changey Kenyan Jesus didn’t want it known that he was in actuality a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Pritzkers and Golden Sacks while he was “foaming the runway” for his TBTF pals after they blew-up the economy.
I don’t think for a minute that the former senator from a state that is home to more corporations than voters, with a population smaller than 47 counties in other states, is doing anything other than enable corporate profiteering, just like his party did when Clinton dismantled the New Deal and shipped industrial production overseas, destroying what was left of the American working class and their unions.
This piece is all about the Kayfabe.
They coulda at least gotten a cauliflower ear or two, LOL.
“…the article fails to consider where both parties are all on board with profiteering, namely in the arms industry and health care, or where price gouging…” You can say that again.
Common Dreams posts some interesting material at times, but all too often just reinforce the lesser evil nonsense and cover up the fact that the US has no functioning democracy to begin with. The Ds are just as bad as the Rs and vice-versa because they clearly represent the same interests. In short, they too often cheer-lead for the status quo.
The Duopoly representatives of oligarchy are good at distractions, superficial gestures, and rearranging deck chairs. The illusion of choice must be maintained to placate the plebs. Emotional “wedge” issues are trotted out every election cycle to divide and distract, while conditions worsen.
Meanwhile, both “parties” are in lock-step on Israel & funding the genocide, subsidies, tax-breaks and giveaways to their donors, imperialism, The Washington Consensus etc.
Congress Crooks openly and legally take bribes from AIPAC, and the rest of the oligarchy. Yet we pretend that the US is a democracy. It is much easier to remain in denial and go along with the contrived drama. Unlimited political bribery is just fine, it’s part of our “democracy”.
Freedom of Speech, Freedom of the Press? Yeah right, just ask Julian Assange how they are treating him in Belmarsh. Ask the families of the Reuters journalists murdered by US forces in Iraq. Ask Ed Snowden who had to flee to Russia for telling the truth.
No problems here folks, just sit back in our easy chairs and “vote” in our wonderful democratic elections, and things will get better, just like they have for the last several decades.
End Citizens United says it right on their website: they are composed of veteran Democratic Party operatives. It was founded by three DCCC staffers, according to Influence Watch. They endorsed Clinton and Biden during the last two elections, and support Elissa Slotkin, the CIA Democrat. The author of the article got her start as Research Director to Kathleen Sebelius
A look at their 2023-2024 donors (at Open Secrets) shows that most of their large individual donors over $1000 are not employed, or retired. They raised 4.3 million from 1275 donors, but raised a total of 8.7 million during the period. It is not clear where the rest of the money came from.
Looks like an intra-party influence brokerage organization. Ending Citizens United is worth doing, but there are other political obligations being serviced here as well. The limitations of the article are just what you would expect from reading their website.
Of course, the Citizens United decision is perverse and formalizes oligarchy. The End Citizens United on the site is just a typical and hollow slogan for them. They know damn well that the corrupt D/R Congress will do nothing. They are “sheepdogs” for the DNC, and bait-and-switch artists just like Sanders, and the other so-called progressives. They talk a good line of BS, then in the end tell us to “vote” for a genocidal sociopath who has dementia.
Two actions will solve our economic problems:
1) Stop warmongering, sanctioning, meddling, interfering, and couping other countries around the globe so that the Department of Defense conducts defense and the Department of State conducts negotiations. All these actions are destructive and a waste of resources.
2) Restore balance to the tax system so that billionaires cannot exist and corporations cannot run government. Because of poor tax policy, enormous wealth has concentrated in few hands. These people buy government and play with finance so the country has been deindustrialized and pauperized.
If the right-wing Supreme Court said that campaign donations are free speech, wouldn’t it take an amendment to the Constitution to roll back that protection? It’s similar to all the anti-gun talk. If something is declared by the Supreme Court as protected by the Bill of Rights, the only legitimate way to get around that protection would be by a specific amendments to that effect. Which is almost impossibly hard to do in our age (see: Equal Rights Amendment). If somebody is going to campaign on an anti-Citizens United or anti-gun platform, I want them to tell me the specifics of how they plan to do that without contravening the Consititution. I’m all for rolling back Citizens United, but let’s not let con artists solicit money for that when they have no practical plan, just empty talk.
Good point Lefty. An amendment is required, true. However, the pres could add justices to SCOTUS to overturn the 5/4 split majority. This won’t happen because the Senate would have to approve and our so-called president has no interest in that. Neither does any prospective “candidate”.
Also, Congress could add justices, but that aint gonna happen either. All three branches of gov. are corrupt, so “checks and balances” can’t work. The democratic republic is now an empire run by a bloodthirsty oligarchy.
People have forgotten already what a hot mess Biden created at the sea ports during the Covid lockdown. Ships waited and waited to unload, but couldn’t. The bureaucracy and infrastructure were inept, compounded by Biden’s passivity.
Now, Biden hasn’t even provide lip service to contain the price gauging. The article in question is misleading by separating the major parties since the same bankster fraudsters donate equally. After all it’s about securing the looting. On the jobs front, the highly touted high employment seems to include part-time, seasonal and temporary minimum wage workers as fully employed. Biden’s approach on jobs is like his presumed discontent with Netanyahu while shipping billions of tax payers money in “humanitarian aid.”
On the border and out-of-control illegal immigration, Biden has been a zero. Ukraine a zero. On Palestinian Genocide, the Administration has been promiscuous in its UN Security Council veto use to protect “little democratic Israel”. Biden’s donors have a hand on that as well
Btw, global migration is at a record high. Not only the US, but Europe and even South Africa, Turkey, Chile, Brazil. You name it. Neoliberalism has done a number globally that along with uncontrollable population growth and climate change which have created a perfect storm. Again, the so-called “leader of the free world” has been an absent leader -zilch again .
As Yves points out, by abrogating responsibility for the economy to the Fed, the administration can get away with protecting special interests over the people. Btw, don’t forget that the Dallas Fed President, Robert Kaplan, and the Boston Fed President, Eric Rosengreen had to resign because they had been engaging in insider training. FED chief, Jerome Powell hasn’t revamped the institution’s compliance requirements yet. Can the Fed be trusted? Biden? The alternative of convicted rapist and criminal sociopath Trump is worse, but by how much?
I read the comments and tend to agree with them, but in the spirit of obligatory oppositional obtusity I’ll latch on to (one of the very scarce) statistics in the above article and propose the following.
“The same report found that prices for consumers rose by 3.4 percent while input costs for producers increased by just 1 percent.”
A business exists to make a profit, and prefers a stable business environment. Some decisions made from DC town over (at least) the past two presidential administrations have resulted in a less than stable business environment. These inflated figures could indicate that businesses are spooked, and have decided the best course of action is “dessert first.” Additionally, inflating prices now gives businesses some near or mid term flexibility/protection in the event of sudden adverse changes in whatever their “input costs” may be.
They didn’t get the name “our corporate overlords” for nothing.