Inflation Nation
Higher prices are less “transitory” than “sticky,” and one party largely bears the blame.
Inflation might be the top issue for every American right now, even if they don’t quite realize it. The prices of everything we buy — from bread and milk to cars and homes — are skyrocketing in 2021. And there’s one thing that’s had an outsized impact on all of this. No, we don’t mean COVID, although that’s certainly part of the story. It’s the change of administration that happened on January 20.
From Day One, President Joe Biden set about to regulate more, mandate more, cancel more, spend more, and tax more than President Donald Trump. You may recall that, until the government response to the ChiCom Virus upended everything last spring, the U.S. economy was humming along quite nicely.
Regular readers know we’ve been beating this drum for a while now. Enhanced unemployment benefits have left now 10.1 million job openings unfilled, creating supply chain issues and higher prices all the way around. Higher energy prices mean it costs more to delivery goods and services. Renewed mask and vaccine mandates are once again putting pressure on the restaurant industry in particular.
Nevertheless, Democrats want to exploit this opportunity to cram through a massive expansion of the welfare state. Biden insists, “If your primary concern right now is the cost of living, you should support [my spending] plan, not oppose it.” No, more federal spending will raise, not lower, the cost of living.
Indeed, all of the above things have more than wiped out whatever wage gains workers thought they might enjoy. According to the GOP members of the House Ways and Means Committee, “For the first six months of his presidency, higher prices have exceeded wage growth every month.” And many economists are warning that what the Biden administration keeps telling us is “transitory” inflation is actually here to stay.
Nearly 80% of registered voters agree: We can thank Biden and his fellow Democrats for this malaise.
It’s all well and good to assign blame where it’s due, but 81 million (yeah, asterisk, we know) Americans voted for Biden last year. And voters put Democrats in charge of both Houses of Congress. So until their own economic interests outweigh other considerations, we’re all going to keep paying more for everything and getting less of it as a result.
