It should be obvious that I’m quite reluctant to say anything which could be construed as supportive of President Trump but I wanted to point out something that may be missed in the din of Trump criticism. Economic activity can be summarized as arising from five factors: personal consumption, business investment, government spending, imports (inversely correlated), and exports. The Trump Administration has put in place or is putting in place measures in all five areas with the objective of increasing growth.
The tax cut was a measure to increase personal consumption as well as business investment. “The Wall” and President Trump’s infrastructure spending proposal are measures to increase government spending. The tariffs that have gone into place are intended to reduce imports as is the support for domestic oil production. The negotiations with China to increase Chinese purchases of U. S. goods will increase exports.
In other words Trump isn’t nearly as scatter-brained as the media might lead you to believe. A tremendous number of his administration’s policies are targeted at increasing economic growth.
Unmentioned; Trumps crampdown on low skilled immigration (both legal and illegal) so the gains are reaped by workers.
Someone I respect made a similar observation last year. That Trumps brew of protectionism, tightening immigration, tax cuts, spending, reinforce each other and have a certain logic to it.
If you judge by intent, then I think you can probably make the case that every administration has a pro-growth agenda.
Steve
You know what they say about intentions.
The relative priority of your intentions and the way in which you go about accomplishing them make a difference.
Sure. So, the Trump team has followed GOP orthodoxy for the most part. They probably really think everything they do will cause growth and that is (partially) their intent. But, if all of that stuff actually worked, they would never lose elections. I am not sure that carrying out the GOP wish list means that they are not scatter-brained. With that team and Trump leading them it is just hard to tell. Trump publicly contradicts himself, and sometimes his staff, so often it looks disorganized. Are we going to judge them only where they end up or do we include how they got there?
Steve
I see little reason to believe there’s anything on the “GOP wish list” other than tax cuts. IMO tax cuts are a way of trying to produce more consumer spending and, at this point of the Laffer curve, not a particularly good one. As you may recall I supported cuts in the corporate income tax because our high corporate income tax put as at a competitive disadvantage but was and am skeptical about cuts in the personal income tax.
Expanding oil production expands exports and reduces imports. If trying to get China to raise its import quotas is part of the “GOP wish list”, they’ve been hiding it pretty well. I don’t recall the subject being raised before. I also don’t recall putting tariffs on steel and aluminum, a way of decreasing imports and one step in bringing the supply chain back onshore, as being part of the Republican orthodoxy. Quite to the contrary, tariffs have been anathema among Republicans for as long as I can recall.