In the lead up to the 2011 election
President Barack Obama called economic inequality, “the defining
issue of our time.” The Republican's dismissed this idea, and
Governor Romney's desperate need to pander to Republican orthodoxy
led him to solidify his reputation as out of touch, with his infamous
“47%” gaffe. FOX News, especially, tried to transform the
egalitarianism of President Obama into a divisive class war.
Yet, when the President triumphed in
the election, he bound himself to his campaign promise with the 2012
State
of the Union address. He would institute higher taxes on
millionaires, reduce interest rates on college debt, fund
improvements in United States infrastructure, and extend the payroll
tax cut. His speech declared those who work hard should be rewarded
with enough to raise a family, own a house, send their children to
college, and retire in comfort. The United States should be a land
of fairness, where equal work creates parity of outcome. For
American international companies the decades of avoiding taxes would
cease, while Wall Street hedge fund managers and bankers would be
held accountable.
The Republican leadership dismissed his
plans, which included educational funding to train workers for high
tech jobs, and explained their trickle down economics where the only
ideology proven to create economic growth. While their rejection of
building an economy which worked for everyone was not unsurprising,
the terminology FOX News used was. Inspired by the discredited Roger
Ailes, the network proclaimed President Obama as engaged in class
warfare. The shrieking critique was devised entirely by FOX, but
mentioned by the other major networks as the horrible redundancy of
self perpetuating asserted itself.
Worked up into a froth over an increase
from 35% to 39.6% for anyone earning over four hundred thousand a
year, with no increase on anyone else, FOX decided to slander the
president's proposals. Fortunately, there is a whole catalog of the
channel's misdeeds here,
where they derided citizens who needed food stamps, unemployment
insurance, and social security, while FOX denigrated the poor as
lazy, violent, and delusional.
The direct accusations leveled against
the President were of dividing the country to win the election, and
once won, to cause discord just to create chaos. It was if FOX was
accusing him of attempting to destroy the unity of the United States,
for the purpose of destroying the United States.
The tone is different now. Realizing
the strength of economic populism, the Republican nominee, Donald
Trump, has proposed his own solutions
to economic inequality. Recognizing it stood against the populace,
FOX News retreated from its condemnation of class warfare, and
refocused its criticism on the condition of the economy.
Since the middle of 2015, Candidate
Trump has, at one point or another, declared his support for various
policies which will benefit the middle class. They include a minimum
wage increase, paid maternity leave, a single payer health system,
deductions on childcare, and investment in the national
infrastructure.
The purpose of this catalog of Trump's
proposals isn't to indicate support for him. Most of his policies
are only shadows compared to the Democratic proposals. For
instance, his plan would provide six weeks of paid leave for
the mother only. In addition, it would pay the amount one receives
from unemployment. Secretary Clinton's paid family leave would
ensure twelve weeks, with mothers and fathers able to split the time
between them. Her's also provides up to two-thirds of one's normal
salary. On the issue of the minimum wage Trump has flipped
and flopped so many times, it's impossible to know what he
would really do.
It isn't that Trump's policies are in
competition with Clinton's, but that's surprising. It's that he even
has them. Neither Senator McCain or Governor Romney even considered
national paid maternity leave. Neither of them would have supported
a single payer healthcare system, or a minimum wage increase. And
they were moderate Republicans. Of course, there are many Republican
politicians still dedicated to the elimination of the policies
already in place, to support mothers and the middle class. The
members of the Freedom Caucus, numbering forty-two in the House, are
dedicated to a complete rollback of social policies, and a reduction
of the tax rates for all brackets.
But that the presidential candidate of
the opposition party is making an effort to offer basic policies is a
sign President Obama won the battle against economic inequality. Or
at least the PR battle. But the judges of economic equality have
some good news for the legacy of the President. The
Atlantic, Washington
Post, and 538
argue the president's policies have, at the worst, kept inequality
from increasing, or at best, begun its recession.
How?
No ones quite sure, but there are some
ideas. Some those ideas President Obama offered in his State of the
Union became law, and began to work to the benefit of those who
needed them. The Affordable Care Act may have been effective as
well, but the data is less conclusive. There is also the possibility
that powers beyond the President's control contributed , such as the
Federal Reserve. And in spite of prior bad news, median household
income (a better measure than mean) rose by five percent last year.
Yet, the work is not completed, and
many still view President Obama's record as a disappointment. One
only has to read Thomas
Frank's article at the Guardian, to realize why Senator
Sanders nearly knocked the crown from Clinton's head, and why she
can't vanquish a man who is unfit the be president of the United
States. The recent release by Wikileaks
of Clinton's Goldman Sachs speeches, only demonstrates what the
Sander's supporters already suspected.
Another economic centrist is headed for the
House!
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