by Toddy Perryman, Hamilton
The late comedian George Carlin once said, “It’s called the American Dream because you have to be asleep to believe it.”
A Wall Street Journal–NORC poll released this week found that only 25% of Americans believe they have a good chance of improving their standard of living. Nearly 70% said it was no longer possible to work hard and get ahead. A majority of those polled said the generation before them had an easier time starting a business, buying a home, or staying at home to parent a child.
The financial/ economic situation is not improving. It is getting worse, at least according to the jobs reporting. The latest report continues the bad news that encouraged the president to fire the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics because he didn’t like the numbers. It turns out that shooting the messenger does not make the message wrong. Trump’s inconsistent policies on tariffs and economic policy are making business leaders wary of hiring new employees due to anticipation of wildly fluctuating future conditions. Uncertainty is a bad thing for a business.
On the immigration front, there was an ICE raid at a Hyundai battery plant that caught up over 400 South Korean immigrants who were here on work visas. So they got deported despite the visas. Maybe these jobs will be taken by native born citizens. There had been a plan to have massive South Korean investment in the electric vehicle and battery plants in Georgia. Not sure if the deportations will nix that deal. Somehow, I don’t think the current policies will encourage international investment in our country. I thought Trump was supposed to be some great deal maker. Maybe deal breaker is more accurate.
Also, I know that the cost of my groceries has gone up.
I think the immigration dragnet to remove so many immigrants is not well thought out. Over 75% of the people deported so far have no criminal record at all. Most were people working in farm fields or meat processing or construction work. These are needed workers. Many of these jobs are simply being lost, not replaced by native born citizens. So our grocery price goes up because there is less available to sell, housing prices go up because of lack of construction workers, etc. The ripples flow out from the initial disturbance in the pond.
Trump is the initial disturbance in our pond. The idea that tariffs are some great income stream is a pipe dream that should have gone up in smoke. The last time they were applied broadly was in the 1930s and they made the Great Depression even worse than the stock market crash. (Look up Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act, signed into law in 1930 by Hoover.) The purpose of the tariffs was to protect domestic businesses from foreign competition. The real result was retaliatory tariffs and a collapse of international trade. The Smoot Hawley Tariff Act became a symbol of failed economic policy. But sure, let’s do this again… The global economy now is more dependent on international trade than it was 100 years ago and we are already seeing a huge loss of international trade since the tariff king’s pronouncements. (In addition to stock market wild swings with each pronouncement.)
Protectionist policies and anti-immigrant sentiment have already harmed our economy. We all could recognize the interdependence of all people, businesses, and governmental bodies. We all do better when we support each other, not try to get ahead by stepping on those who are also working hard to do better. I prefer to buy local so that my dollars stay in my community and not go to some corporate headquarters. I don’t care if the local business is owned by immigrants or not. These would be my neighbors, no matter where they were born.