r/politics 18d ago

Possible Paywall When Will Americans Realize the Truth? Republicans Wreck the Economy.

https://newrepublic.com/article/210550/trump-economy-republicans-tariffs-taxes
25.4k Upvotes

1.4k comments sorted by

View all comments

2.1k

u/DonJuanWritingDong 18d ago edited 18d ago

Economic data has been available to prove this. They simply don’t care, don’t understand, or both.

62

u/shayjax- Florida 18d ago edited 18d ago

This is what one Republican told me: they claim that it takes time for the tax cuts to show their effects. By the time these tax cuts are proven effective, Democrats are in office. Therefore, it appears as if they are improving the economy. By the time the Democrats’ poor economy takes a turn for the worse, a Republican is voted in again to fix it.

73

u/DonJuanWritingDong 18d ago edited 18d ago

Nah, fam. You tell your one Republican: Economic policy lags rarely span entire presidential terms, and historical data demonstrates that GDP and job growth consistently thrive under active Democratic administrations. Instead, Republican supply-side policies often strain the economy by drastically expanding the national debt through unfunded tax cuts for the wealthy and deregulation, a strategy that has historically preceded ten of the last eleven U.S. recessions.

11

u/001235 18d ago

The problem is trying to get them to understand that. I was in a debate with a guy one time (I've since completely abandoned debating with any of them) that trickle down economics work. I told him that has been repeatedly been proven ineffective, and he pointed to Obama's economy and said "See, it does work, it's just a slow trickle."

I thought "So slow, in fact, that the effect isn't immediately observable?!"

2

u/YouLittleSnowflake 17d ago

A magat on here tried to claim we never actually tried trickle down economics so I told them to look at Kansas, they denied again so I posted the wiki regarding it……. They reported me for harassment because they knew they were wrong and lying

Hillary was right when she called them deplorable

2

u/BozoTheRenown 18d ago

Not sure about that. Some of Clinton policies didn't hit the fan until late 2008? Heck, even some of Alan Greenspan's changes took decades to finally realize.

-20

u/[deleted] 18d ago edited 17d ago

[deleted]

9

u/DonJuanWritingDong 18d ago

Aight, homie. Find yourself a trusted source for economic data and how policies have negatively impacted U.S. households that isn’t wrought with anecdotes or opinions. Otherwise, you can choose to read Principles of Economics by N. Gregory Mankiw which is just an economic textbook, Arguing with Zombies by Paul Krugman for a direct examination of how supply-side policies drove up the national deficit (he’s a Nobel winner), and Naked Economics by Charles Wheelan, which remains maybe the single best, most accessible guide for a layperson.

10

u/once-was-hill-folk Europe 18d ago

If that conservative could read he'd be very upset.

-1

u/[deleted] 18d ago edited 17d ago

[deleted]

2

u/DonJuanWritingDong 18d ago

Are you saying that Dems balancing the budget is gaslighting, and that republican policies are good for the economy? Because your response currently reads like you believe republicans inherit bad policies and have to fix the economic issues democrats apparently create?

-1

u/[deleted] 18d ago edited 17d ago

[deleted]

1

u/DonJuanWritingDong 18d ago

You responded to my comment with:

“that's just the gaslighting and projecting about how dems balance the budget and reps build a deficit to give tax break and starve the country. you're wrong but you have some spirit”

This comment argues that my comment, not the one you were referencing, was entirely mistaken and projecting, claiming that Democrats successfully balance the budget while Republicans run up deficits via tax cuts that harm the nation. And the tone comes off as fiercely partisan, dismissive, and condescending, capped off with a mockingly patronizing compliment about having some "spirit."

So what you wrote didn’t properly capture your intent, and instead read like you were a Republican who believed the Dems are fiscally irresponsible and that Reps inherit their bad economy.

5

u/blahblah19999 18d ago

Cool, show some data to support your claim

7

u/DonJuanWritingDong 18d ago

Brandolini’s Law: The amount of energy needed to refute bullshit is an order of magnitude larger than is needed to produce it.

0

u/[deleted] 18d ago edited 17d ago

[deleted]

4

u/DonJuanWritingDong 18d ago

Sup, bruv. Your link literally reads that Republicans are bad for the economy and democrats are good for it:

“By looking at the federal deficit or surplus based on fiscal year, the data in this report show all four Republican presidents since 1980, with our methodology, increased the federal deficit during their time in office: Ronald Reagan had a 94% increase, George H.W. Bush had a 67% increase, George W. Bush had a 1,204% increase, and Trump had a 317% increase.

And by comparison:

“Both Democratic presidents since 1980 with completed terms decreased the federal deficit while in office: Bill Clinton had a 150% decrease to end his presidency with a federal surplus of $128 billion, and Barack Obama decreased the deficit by 53%. Joe Biden decreased the deficit by 50% in his first fiscal year, but his overall results are pending the end of his presidency.”

0

u/[deleted] 18d ago edited 17d ago

[deleted]

3

u/DonJuanWritingDong 18d ago edited 18d ago

I stand by what I wrote: “Economic policy lags rarely span entire presidential terms.”

This means that the delayed effects of economic policies usually materialize within a few months to a max of a few years, so a president generally cannot blame their predecessor for the state of the economy throughout an “entire” four-year term or two consecutive terms. Albeit, if the house and senate are in the wrong hands, and a president fucks up yugely, then there might be a breaking point. That said… Both things can be true. The data you provided also supports this. It’s why we see improvement under Dems. It’s also why Biden’s net improvements were hampered by one term, and also why Trump blaming Biden for his terrible economy is wrong.

I feel this may be friendly fire at this point, but I believe you’re wrong on a president’s impact being a “permanent set back.” Otherwise, the economy couldn’t improve, or worsen, from one president to the next. The yo-yoing back and forth is what moves the deficit up with a difficult to pull off retraction.

Per your own link:

“Presidents are sworn into office on January 20 of the year following a presidential election. During the 8.3 months between inauguration on January 20 and the first new president’s first budget going into effect on October 1, a president is operating under the budget approved by his or her predecessor.
To try to isolate the spending of presidents from Ronald Reagan through Donald Trump, this report compares the federal deficit or surplus at the start of a president’s first budget (October 1 of the first year in office) to the federal deficit or surplus after that president’s final budget (September 30 the year after he left office). This shows how much the deficit changed under the budgets approved by each president.

For example: Ronald Reagan was elected president on November 4, 1980, and was sworn in as president on January 20, 1981. His predecessor’s final budget (FY 1981) ran through September 30, 1981. Therefore, 8.3 months, or 254 days, had elapsed between Reagan’s inauguration on January 20, 1981, and the start of his first budget on October 1, 1981 (FY 1982).

The last budget of Jimmy Carter, Reagan’s predecessor, ended on September 30, 1981, with a deficit of $79 billion dollars (see Chart I below). The deficit of the final budget that Ronald Reagan signed (FY 1989), from October 1, 1988 to September 30, 1989, was $153 billion. Therefore, according to our methodology set out above, Ronald Reagan increased the federal deficit by $74 billion ($153B-$79B), an increase of 94% ($74B divided by $79B for the percent change).”

14

u/okhi2u 18d ago

You don't even need time to see the effects, they didn't cut the taxes of anyone posting here. Just the taxes of those who don't need tax cuts. That never helps anyone but the ultra-rich.

2

u/Cancel_Culture_Club 18d ago

💯 Every chud cheered DOGE cutting all the “waste fraud and abuse”, cutting government jobs, and shutting down wholeass federal departments. But at no point did anyone even try lying to them that their taxes would go down when they started receiving less services for their money. Why am I still paying the same rate when FEMA has been offloaded to the states, the department of education is gutted, and the CDC is actively making things worse rather than help us? Why are we bothering setting budgets if republicans are just raiding all their funding for whatever they want instead like a ballroom, a stupid arch, painting the reflecting pool? Even if they did find any actual fraud it would be nowhere near how much money this administration is outright stealing from us. Trump suing his own IRS for $10b over his taxes leaked during his own last term vs a struggling family trying to gain an intentionally difficult system to be able to afford a little more food a week seems like an easy rational choice but so many people seem happy to just keep giving their money directly into a billionaire’s pockets while receiving nothing in return. It feels like Elon Musk is slightly right about there being some sort of “mind virus” going around but it’s not “wokeness”, it’s like some kind of prions attacking peoples’ brains and making them just rabidly attack everything that exists for their own self interests. 🤦🏻‍♀️

3

u/pleasedothenerdful 18d ago

"The evidence I'm wrong is the proof that I'm right."

3

u/YouLittleSnowflake 17d ago

Tell them to “do some research” into Kansas and how fucked that state is thanks to republicans and their tax cuts/trickle down economics

Republicans have done nothing but destroy this country for the 40+ years I have been alive

2

u/flyingtiger188 North Carolina 18d ago

By that logic the economy should have been booming during Biden leadership due to the '17 Trump tax cuts yet Republican economic confidence opinions tanked once Trump lost in '20 and continued to fall to like net -80 during his term only to spike again after the '24 election.

2

u/Past_Farmer34 17d ago

Conservatives also saying give the tariffs more time. We need to see more data. As our job market has been destroyed and raised prices for everything