The Biden Administration is turning in a record great performance on managing the economy. So why do people still trust Trump and the Republicans more? Because Republicans provide voters with a narrative that explains their motives and how their actions drive economic success. We don’t.
Thank you to all the wonderful people who attended my sessions at the Network NOVA Women’s Summit and at Fairfax County Democrats’ precinct organizer training! Thank you to Stair Calhoun, Katherine White, Robbin Warner, Finale Norton and everybody at Network NOVA, and Maria Vorel at FCDC for inviting me, and for your friendship and encouragement!
Why don’t voters trust us to handle the economy?
Why, why, why do Republicans still have the advantage on who voters trust to manage the economy? Despite what can only be described as a miraculous job, with inflation coming down and wages going up, President Biden and the Democrats in Congress are not getting anywhere near the credit they deserve. Could anything provide clearer evidence that we have a major problem with our messaging?
Most of our messaging is a laundry list of facts, policies, and spending. What we’re trying to communicate is, “Look at everything we’re doing for you.” Unfortunately, people primarily make political decisions based on what they feel to be morally right, and virtually never based on a rational evaluation of what’s in their best interest.
When it comes to the economy, many voters believe that “the right thing to do” is to put people in office that know what they are doing when it comes to the economy, and for some reason, they don’t think that’s us.
Why do some voters believe that, and what can we do about it?
It’s the Philosophy, Stupid.
Most people think that Republicans understand how the economy works and know what to do with government to make the economy grow. This is because Republicans have invested fifty years and billions of dollars in their mission to frame the entire public debate in terms of “market fundamentalist” philosophy.
Here is how Republicans could portray our actions, from the perspective of their “free-market” ideology:
Democrats are doing what they always do: throw money at the problem. They spend money, go into debt, and raise taxes. They are bragging about this great list of accomplishments, but everything they are doing is actually bad for the economy. They don’t understand the facts about how the economy really works. They make their decisions based on Liberal ideology: they think spending and big government is the solution to everything.
Sadly, most people still do believe that the economy works the way that Republicans say it works. That’s why we can’t just point to reality and say, “We did that.” If we expect people to understand that our actions are the cause of positive economic outcomes, we have to connect the dots for them.
We have to explain, from our perspective, how the economy works and why government plays such critically important roles in keeping the economy stable, providing the public services and resources without which it could not function, putting it back on its feet after a crisis and using investment and consumer protections to bring down inflation.
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The Anatomy of an Economic Message
Economic messaging only works if presented in the context of a coherent economic philosophy. To do that, the following things need to be put into words and communicated to our audiences:
Who is taking action?
What action is being taken?
What are you/they trying to achieve?
How do these actions lead to the intended outcomes?You connect the dots like this: “Because the economy works in X way, using government to do Y is the right thing to do.” In this case, right often means both most effective and morally right.
Why do people think Donald Trump did a good job of handling the economy?
We say, “The only thing Donald Trump did while in office was cut taxes for the rich.” In the context of their framing, he did exactly what he was supposed to do, and what all Republicans do. Let’s break it down:
Who is taking action? Donald Trump and Republicans.
What action is being taken? Cutting taxes for the rich and reducing regulations.
What are you trying to do? Grow the economy and create jobs.
How do these actions lead to the intended outcomes?The economy works best in its most natural state. We expand the economy by giving more money to the rich, because they create the jobs. For these reasons, cutting taxes for the rich and getting regulations out of their way is the effective thing to do. It’s also morally right because taxes and restraints on economic activity violate our freedom by depriving us of our God-given constitutional private property rights.
Most economists now know that free-market ideology is a bunch of B.S. However the public debate doesn’t run on facts. It runs on narratives, and this narrative is still the dominant one.
Democratic Messaging
These talking points were pulled from messaging memos recently circulated by leading Democratic organizations. I have grouped them and sorted them into the following categories:
Who is taking action?
President Biden
There is no mention of Democrats. We will never convince anybody that Democrats know how best to use government to manage the economy if we never say the word “Democrat.” Get in the habit of saying, “Democrats believe this,” and “Democrats do that.”
What action are we taking?
Passed the CHIPS and Science Act
Passed the Inflation Reduction Act
Investing in America. Making historic national investments in manufacturing, clean energy, and our health care system.
Fixing roads and bridges.
Delivering clean water and high-speed internet.
Bringing supply chains home.
Promoting competition.
Taking on Big Pharma.
Capping the price of insulin.
Fighting special interests.
Making sure the wealthy pay their fair share.
What are we trying to do?
Bring inflation down.
Lower costs for working families. Bring down prescription drug prices. Lower energy bills.
Grow the middle class. Create good-paying union jobs.
What have we already achieved?
Created more than 13 million jobs since President Biden took office.
Lowered inflation down to less than half of where it was a year ago.
How do these actions lead to the intended outcomes?
*crickets*
We don’t even mention the word “government.” All the actions listed above are good, but nothing explains how the actions relate to each other or how they are supposed to lead to the outcomes. It does not refute the Republican interpretation of our actions, and it does not communicate that Democrats have their own operational theory of how the economy works.
Just a few days ago, only 19% of people surveyed actually thought President Biden’s actions were slowing inflation.
What our actions sound like in the context of our economic philosophy.
We’re trying to convince people that the economy is doing great, and it is. But let’s go back to where this economic story begins. Republicans say Democrats shut down the economy during Covid.
What shut down the economy? How is the economy doing now?
When Covid shut down the global economy, President Biden and the Democrats in Congress did an outstanding job of using a variety of government stimulus programs to make sure that businesses could stay afloat and people could still pay their bills.
Thanks to our keeping consumer demand up, the economy made the fastest recovery in history (because consumer demand is what drives economic growth and the economy grows from the bottom up). People returned to work in droves, creating the lowest unemployment we’ve seen in many decades!
What caused inflation?
People had saved up and needed to buy things, but due to years of business consolidation, offshoring manufacturing and failure to plan ahead causing parts shortages and supply chain bottlenecks, businesses didn’t have enough supply to meet the demand, so prices went up. (The market frequently screws things up due to chronic short term thinking.)
Plus, greedy companies took advantage of the situation to raise prices even higher. (Businesses don’t always do what’s in the best interest of society.)
What action did we take and why?
Everybody said that the only way to reduce inflation would be to drive up unemployment and slow down the economy, but people having money to spend is supposed to be a good thing. (As people who live together in a society, we have a shared responsibility for each other’s well-being.) There’s a better way to lower inflation. We took action, reducing inflation by increasing the supply to meet the demand.
How? President Biden and the Democrats stopped shipping companies from price gouging (reinstated consumer protections) and cracked down on corporate monopoly behavior (enforced anti-trust laws). We fixed supply chain bottlenecks, brought parts suppliers back home and created tons of new manufacturing jobs (especially in clean energy and microchips: high tech good paying jobs that don’t require a college degree).
What impact did this have?
American workers can now produce enough goods and services to meet consumer demand, so prices are coming down and inflation is less than half what it was a year ago. More people have jobs than ever and wages are still going up (assisted by our support for workers’ rights.) Some would say that’s an economic miracle, but that’s just Bidenomics.
This narrative relies on a totally different understanding of how the economy works. I have written more about that in previous issues of this newsletter (see notes below).
People rarely talk about this, but if we did talk about it, people would immediately recognize it to be true: Markets are irrational and prone to bubbles and crashes. A stable, functional economy requires consistent supervision and maintenance by government. Even a thriving economy depends on a whole host of public goods and services provided by government.
The Bottom Line
In a crisis, our economic system requires aggressive and skillful government intervention and investment. The Biden administration and the Democrats in Congress handled the economy expertly, like a seasoned captain steering a ship through a 100-year storm. Without their leadership, we’d still be in a major recession with sky-high unemployment.
Thanks, as always, for reading and subscribing! I hope you are able to use this in your work and your activism!
In solidarity,
Antonia
NOTES:
More thoughts on our Democratic philosophy.
Thank you for these talking points! I’ve been so frustrated and worried about the Republicans’ narrative on the economy dominating. This is a smart analysis, and I’ll put it to use!