According the numerous economists and publications, the American economy is booming, yet most Americans polled disagree with that assessment and many say they were better off during the Trump years. What gives?
My progressive friends tend to dismiss these poll results, saying it’s mostly “low-information” Trump supporters who on down on the economy and their opinions don’t matter. That’s because Trump supporters are dumb, deluded and willfully ignorant - per my friends, not me!
Which got me wondering: how do Americans arrive at their opinions of the economy?
“Overall, our cross-country comparison for 10 [developed] countries concludes that the phenomenon of a discrepancy between [official economic indicators] and consumer sentiment is not unique to the United States but is prevalent across multiple countries.” - The Cost of Money is Part of the Cost of Living: New Evidence on the Consumer Sentiment (Bolhuis et al, 2024)
Around this time, journalists, social scientists, and even philosophers provided helpful lists of expressions associated with gaslighting to help individuals and groups recognize when they’ve been victims. For example….
Harris Supporter (before the election): “[Trump’s] message is straight-up misogyny, transphobia, racism, xenophobia. This is the kind of President he is, and Trump voters must know this. If Trump wins, that means this is who America is also.”
Never-Trumper/Critic of the Left (before the election): “One of the reasons Trump is going to win so easily is the CONSTANT accusations of misogyny, homophobia, transphobia, and racism from progressives. Translation: ‘Shut up, you're not allowed to talk about things.’ “
Trump Supporter (after the Election): “This is where the war with reality has taken the Democratic Party…And reality always wins, sooner or later. More precisely, in this case, the people's common sense has spoken.”
Compared to many European countries, America seems to go rather easy on its high-income taxpayers…Of course, appearances can be deceiving.
“Russia has been plotting to place incendiary devices on cargo planes in Europe and even performed a test run this summer, setting off fires at shipping hubs in Britain and Germany,” the New York Times reported [November 5, 2024].
“The United States probably cannot break the link between China and Russia, especially in the near future while the Ukraine war continues. But it can attenuate that link, for example, by leveraging Beijing’s interest in maintaining a positive relationship with Europe and by adopting a balanced strategy toward Beijing itself. U.S. leaders should be cognizant that there is a connection between the degree of hostility Beijing perceives from Washington and its willingness to provide meaningful support to Moscow. It would therefore be dangerous for Washington to make the cooperation between these states a framing strategic concept.” - Cooperation Between China, Iran, North Korea, and Russia: Current and Potential Future Threats to America by Christopher S. Chivvis and Jack Keating/Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. October 8, 2024
“For the past few years, civilian life in northern Norway has been under constant, low-grade attack. Russian hackers have targeted small municipalities and ports with phishing scams, ransomware, and other forms of cyber warfare, and individuals travelling as tourists have been caught photographing sensitive defense and communications infrastructure.” - Ben Taub, Russia’s Espionage War in the Arctic/The New Yorker, September 9, 2024
Ten years ago the Kremlin worked with America and Europe to counter Iran and North Korea’s nuclear programme. Such co-operation is now fanciful. “It is as if the Russians no longer feel they have a stake in preserving anything of the post-war international order,” says Mr Radchenko…Mr Putin embraces these ideas. “We are in for probably the most dangerous, unpredictable and at the same time most important decade since the end of World War II,” he said in late 2022. “To cite a classic,” he added, invoking an article by Vladimir Lenin in 1913, “this is a revolutionary situation.” - Vladimir Putin’s spies are plotting global chaos: Russia is enacting a revolutionary plan of sabotage, arson and assassination, The Economist, October 13, 2024.
Putin’s Worldview: Themes and Variations …
Anti-liberalism (liberalism = political and civil freedoms)
Orthodox Church: central to national and moral identity
Imperial nostalgia (Tsar Nicholas I – those were the days!)
Family values: “The main purpose of the family is to have children, about procreation, and thus, the perpetuation of our people and our centuries-old history”, per Putin, January 2024 (link)
“The Russian Federation intends to give priority to preventing and resolving armed conflicts, improving inter-state relations, and ensuring stability in the near abroad, including preventing the instigation of "colour revolutions" and other attempts to interfere in the internal affairs of Russia's allies and partners.” (Per Wikipedia: “The colour revolutions were a series of often non-violent protests and accompanying (attempted or successful) changes of government and society that took place in post-Soviet states... The aim of the colour revolutions was to establish Western-style liberal democracies. They were primarily triggered by election results widely viewed as falsified.”)
"Russia does not consider itself to be an enemy of the West, is not isolating itself from the West and has no hostile intentions with regard to it, …[but] in response to unfriendly actions of the West, Russia intends to defend its right to existence and freedom of development using all means available" [emphasis added] - The Concept of the Foreign Policy of the Russian Federation, approved by Decree of the President of the Russian Federation, dated March 31, 2023
"Moscow’s hostility towards the West is just the tip of the iceberg. In terms of a grand strategy, Moscow, under President Putin’s leadership, desires a return to the power balance of the past wherein the Soviet Union was a superpower and could thus define the rules of the international order on a global level." - Russia’s hybrid war against the West , by Arsalan Bilal.
By responsible, I mean the UBI:
Would not add to the national debt
Would not rely on unstable revenue sources, such as income or wealth taxes
Would not reduce labor market participation overall (work incentives and disincentives would balance out across the population and over time)
Would not be based on unrealistic scenarios of societal change (e.g, robots or AI replacing most human workers, the rich footing the bill, capitalism gone or much minimized)
Etc.
“…despite ample proof to the contrary*, many polls still show voters think Trump would still have an edge over Harris on handling the economy. We can chalk that up at least in part to short-term memory loss of the Trump administration’s chaos, along with [post-pandemic] inflation…” - Hayes Brown/MSNBC Opinion Writer/Editor September 29, 2024 [my italics]
Over 80% of the Democrats and Democrat leaners agreed on 12 of the 24 issue statements. Republicans and Republican leaners did not reach 80% agreement on any statement and strongly disagreed with just one statement (that abortion should be legal in any circumstance). What that tells me is ...
What this data tells me is that one reason healthcare spending is out of control in the US is that the cost of healthcare services isn’t being borne by the ultimate consumer - patients - but by third parties, mainly insurers, employers, and the federal government. And these third parties are less sensitive to price than individuals and households (for various reasons, including ability to pay, lack of market power, and an artificial shortage of healthcare providers).
The University of Michigan’s Consumer Sentiment Index (CSI) is regarded as one of the leading indicators of consumer confidence in the United States. The CSI survey asks consumers about their own personal finances, as well as their views on the state of the US economy. As measured by the CSI, consumer confidence typically drops right before recessionary periods, whereas rising consumer confidence predicts increased consumer spending and economic growth. This pattern is clear in the following chart...
So it doesn’t surprise me that political groups can agree on the same moral basics but still doubt each other’s moral commitments. This doubt may not reflect a misunderstanding or lack of trust but real disagreement on how foundational values and principles should be applied in real life.
“Sense of agency refers to the feeling of control over actions and their consequences.” - James W Moore, What Is the Sense of Agency and Why Does it Matter?