American Politics

[Tiny 12]

I think maybe, Mike Lee could be a great VP for King Trump 2024.

While I disagree with Mike Lee about some social issues and Trump, I believe he'd make a great president. It's interesting you like him, considering he's about as close as you'll come to a Libertarian, on economic policy at least, in the Senate or House.

...the Republicans held leads on the remaining subjects, including being for working people (a 7-point advantage), standing up to elites (8 points), being able to get things done for the American people (12 points), feeling safe (12 points) and keeping wages and salaries up with the cost of living (17 points).

The American people are wiser than some believe.

[Tiny 12]

My link substantiated my point. Your link substantiated nothing
regarding jobs and wages.

regarding jobs and wages.

Wasn't this your admission about your link not supporting the notion that Trump and his Repubs' TCJA measurably increased hiring or wages? And certainly not by 2020, the last year of Trump's so-called presidency and when his years' long efforts to identify and facilitate the inevitable Great Repub Economic Crash and Massive Jobs Destruction as is required of all Repub potuses came to fruition?

I'll repost the link to the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) paper here. Thirty-nine Nobel Prize winners in economics, 14 members of the Presidents' Council of Eonomic Advisors, and three of the four authors of the paper in question were members of the nonpartisan NBER.

https://conference.nber.org/conf_papers/f191672.pdf

Actually the link does "support the notion that Trump and his Repubs' TCJA measurably increased hiring or wages." It just doesn't attempt to quantify the increase.

Please see Figure 9 on page 45. The blue line shows the estimated increase in labor taxes as a % of the pre-TCJA corporate tax revenue, which results from implementation of the TCJA. By the third year (2020), labor taxes are up by 10% of corporate revenue, and by year 10, they're 15% of corporate revenue. The increase in labor taxes results from an increase in (a) wages and (b) employment, as a result of the TCJA. Again, I'm not saying the corporate tax changes in the TCJA are / were entirely responsible for lower unemployment and higher real wages, but I believe they were partly responsible.

The effect on tax revenues is interesting. You sum the solid red and blue lines on the graph to come up with the net change in corporate tax revenues. In the initial years, the drop in corporate tax revenues is greater than the increase in labor taxes, so the net effect is lower total tax revenues. After year 4 though, total tax revenues are actually higher than they would have been without the TCJA. Go out to year 20, and the Treasury is collecting 18% more tax revenue, expressed as a % of pre-TCJA corporate tax revenue, than it would have otherwise! That's why I say there were no losers here, only winners. The companies, the workers and the Treasury all benefit.

This is a good example of how a Republican led change in policy resulted in benefits to the economy years after it was first implemented. The measures passed during the Biden administration, in particular the American Rescue Plan, were more like sugar highs. They boost the economy while the money's being spent, but then the longer term repercussions, like the increase in the national debt, don't justify the short term high. Admittedly there are long term gains to be had from, for example, the bipartisan infrastructure bill. But given all the pork and inefficiency associated with the Federal bill, I believe local and state fixes for most infrastructure shortcomings are a better way of dealing with inadequate and outdated infrastructure.

So then you nitpick over my link that substantiates unequivally that wages were raised and how they were raised in dozens of states and cities in 2020. Mostly blue states and blue cities, where the vast majority of the Labor Force of the United States of America reside anyway. LOL.

How does raising the minimum wage of a relatively small percent of the labor force matter to the overall increase in wages and bring more workers into the force?

Well, first of all it did it a damn sight better, more effectively and provably so than anything you have ever shown that idiotic TCJA did.

Second, raising the minimum wage for new, entry and lower level jobs will logically force employers to raise the wages of those who have been working for them for years in higher level, higher responsibility jobs. This generates a ripple effect. Similar to the ripple effect we all just saw the UAW create in the auto industry where even non union manufacturers had to up their game with their employees too or risk losing them. If a longer term and presumably more experienced and skilled employee can more easily walk away (those are called "quits" in the labor market) and start fresh at another company with at least some assurance that he / she will be paid a livable wage after the minimum wage has been raised, that employer had better start sweetening the deal for that level of worker as well.

Like I said, intuitively I don't believe this made much of a difference, but I'd like to see more info. Here are a list of recent state and local changes in the minimum wage at mid-year 2023.

https://ogletree.com/insights-resour...age-increases/

Are these increases, since the last increase in the minimum wage, in excess of the high inflation that has occurred, coincidentally or not, during the Biden administration? Certainly some of them are not. Take a look at Illiniois.

Similarly, if you want to convince me or anybody else that the changes in 2020 were responsible for significantly higher real wages in 2020, you need to find out when the minimum wage last changed in the various jurisdictions, and the amount of the increases. Additional info about the total number of workers and number who were receiving less than the minimum wage would be needed too.

While I believe in the majority of or most cases, increased minimum wages are a good idea, please note that higher minimum wages result in lower employment. Or that's the conventional wisdom. I suspect your belief that a higher minimum wage could bring more people into the labor force may be valid when there's a shortage of labor, like right now. I have to give you credit for thinking out of the box about that.

You and I presented charts showing "median usual weekly real earnings" and median real household income. All minimum wage workers receive less than the median. Increases in minimum wages would only increase the median figures to the extent that they push up wages of higher paid workers.

See, this notion that Wingers conjure up to flatter their ego and sell that BS to the masses about that idiotic Repub Supply-Side / Trickle-Down tax and economic philosophy is "good" for lower and middle income earners too and not just applied to make it easier for CEOs to set aflame $1000 bills to light their cigars utterly misses the Real World detail that the last thing most major corporations and companies want to do is hire more employees. They do so when they HAVE TO if it looks like they will not have plenty of those $1000 bill cigar lighters in their future unless they do. Just because Trump and every other Repub puts extra cash in their pocket does not inspire them to hire one more American with it.

The NBER paper provides an excellent example of how supply side economics can be a win win for everyone.

LOL. So Trump dared to reverse his pitch that getting a vaccine is unnecessary, naturally got booed for it by his cult followers who never heard him utter such a thing before, and that so terrified him he never uttered it in public again.

Meanwhile:

New COVID Strain May Evade Vaccines, Alarming Health Officials.
Aug. 24, 2023

https://www.webmd.com/covid/news/202...alth-officials

Yep, if Trump, his cult followers in and out of the Repub Pink Now Smaller Tinkle House and Senate, DeSantis. RFK Jr and Bill Maher can see to it that just 50,000 - 60,000 more Americans die from Trump's Pandrmic by mocking or denigrating known mitigation and vaccine efforts, they will have successfully Mass Murdered more Americans than were killed in all the military conflicts since and including the Civil War.

I'm not worried so much about vaccine hesitancy related to COVID anymore. I am worried about ideas like Democrat Robert F. Kennedy Jr's spreading. Too many parents may refuse to vaccinate their children for other diseases because of concerns about autism and the like. The outcome would not be pretty.

[MarquisdeSade1]

"Fighting satan aka the DNC and the deep state.

https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2...-defense-bill/

I think maybe, Mike Lee could be a great VP for King Trump 2024."

Mike Lee / Andy Biggs ticket in 2028.

The MAGA bench is rock solid from today on, the Democratic side ROTFLMMFAO.

[MarquisdeSade1]

Opinion.

Guest essay.

'This Is Grim,' One Democratic Pollster Says.

Dec. 6, 2023.

A man wearing a suit (President Biden), seen from behind, speaks at an event.

Credit. Andrew Caballero-Reynolds / Agence France-Presse — Getty Images.

Share full article.

428.

Thomas be. Edsall.

By Thomas be. Edsall.

Mr. Edsall contributes a weekly column from Washington, the. See. , on politics, demographics and inequality.

Sign up for the Opinion Today newsletter Get expert analysis of the news and a guide to the big ideas shaping the world every weekday morning. Get it sent to your inbox.

The predictive power of horse-race polling a year from the presidential election is weak at best. The Biden campaign can take some comfort in that. But what recent surveys do reveal is that the coalition that put Joe Biden in the White House in the first place is nowhere near as strong as it was four years ago.

These danger signs include fraying support among core constituencies, including young voters, Black voters and Hispanic voters, and the decline, if not the erasure, of traditional Democratic advantages in representing the interests of the middle class and speaking for the average voter.

Any of these on their own might not be cause for alarm, but taken together they present a dangerous situation for Biden.

From Nov. 5 through Nov. 11, Democracy Corps, a Democratic advisory group founded by Stan Greenberg and James Carville, surveyed 2,500 voters in presidential and Senate battleground states as well as competitive House districts.

ADVERTISEMENT.

SKIP ADVERTISEMENT.

In an email, Greenberg summarized the results: "This is grim. " The study, he said, found that collectively, voters in the Democratic base of "Blacks, Hispanics, Asians, LGBTQ+ community, Gen Z, millennials, unmarried and college women give Trump higher approval ratings than Biden. ".

On 32 subjects ranging from abortion to China, the Democracy Corps survey asked voters to choose which would be better, "Biden and the Democrats" or "Trump and the Republicans. ".

Biden and the Democrats led on six: women's rights (ahead by 17 points), climate change (15 points), addressing racial inequality (10 points), health care (3 points), the president will not be an autocrat (plus 2) and protecting Democracy (plus 1). There was a tie on making democracy more secure.

Donald Trump and the Republicans held leads on the remaining subjects, including being for working people (a 7-point advantage), standing up to elites (8 points), being able to get things done for the American people (12 points), feeling safe (12 points) and keeping wages and salaries up with the cost of living (17 points).

In the case of issues that traditionally favor Republicans, Trump and his allies held commanding leads: patriotism (11 points), crime (17 points), immigration (20 points) and border security (22 points).

Editors' Picks.

Penguins Take Thousands of Naps Every Day.

Is It Too Late to Get a Flu Shot?

George Santos Uses Cameo Videos to Make, of All Things, an Honest Buck.

Particularly worrisome for Democrats, who plan to demonize Trump as a threat to democracy, are the advantages Trump and Republicans have on opposing extremism (3 points), getting beyond the chaos (6 points) and protecting the Constitution (8 points).

There is some evidence in both the Democracy Corp survey and in other polls that concerns specific to Biden — including his age and the surge in prices during his presidency — are driving the perception of Democratic weakness rather than discontent with the party itself.

The survey found, for example, that Democratic candidates in House battleground districts are running even with their Republican opponents among all voters, and two points ahead among voters who say they are likely to cast ballots on Election Day.

Along similar lines, a November 2023 NBC News poll found Trump leading Biden by two points, 46-44, but when voters were asked to choose between Trump and an unnamed Democratic candidate, the generic Democrat won 46-40.

In a reflection of both Biden's and Trump's high unfavorability ratings, NBC reported that when voters were asked to choose between Biden and an unnamed generic Republican, the "Republican candidate" led Biden 48-37.

Other nonpartisan polls describe similar Democratic weaknesses. A September Morning Consult survey found, for example, that "voters are now more likely to see the Republican Party as capable of governing, tackling big issues and keeping the country safe compared with the Democratic Party" and that "by a 9-point margin, voters also see the Democratic Party as more ideologically extreme than the G. O. P. ".

In the main, according to Morning Consult, these weaknesses result from declining confidence within Democratic ranks in their own party, rather than strong support for Trump and the Republican Party: "The trends against the Democratic Party are largely driven by worsening perceptions among its own voter base, which suggests that the party will have to rely more than ever on negative partisanship to keep control of the White House. "

Morning Consult posed the same set of questions to voters about the political parties in 2020 and again this year in order to track shifting voter attitudes.

Asked, for example which party is more "capable of governing," 48 percent of voters in 2020 said the Democrats and 42 percent said the Republicans. This year, 47 percent said the Republicans and 44 percent said the Democrats.

Similar shifts occurred on the question of which party will "keep the nation safe" and which party can "tackle the big issues. "

In what amounts to a body blow to Biden and his Democratic allies, Republicans are now virtually tied with Democrats on a matter that has been a mainstay of Democratic support since the formation of the New Deal coalition during the Great Depression. A September 2023 NBC News survey "found that 34 percent of voters believe Republicans are better at looking out for the middle class, while 36 percent say the same of Democrats. The 2-point margin in favor of Democrats is the lowest it has been in the history of the poll. ".

"Democrats have held over 30 years as high as a 29-point advantage as being the party better able to deal with and handle issues of concern to the middle class, " Bill McInturff, a partner in the Republican firm Public Opinion Strategies, which joined with the Democratic firm Hart Research to conduct the NBC poll, told me.

Neil Newhouse, who is also a partner at Public Opinion Strategies, emailed me to say that the opinion trends among Black and Hispanic voters "are figures G. O. P. 'ers could only dream about a few years ago. ".

Although many of those with whom I discussed the data voiced deep concern over Biden's prospects, let me cite a couple of experts who are more optimistic.

Simon Rosenberg, a veteran Democratic operative and former president of the New Democratic Network, emailed me a series of bullet points:

The last four presidential elections have gone 51 percent-46 percent Democratic, best run for Dems since F. The. Are. 's elections. Only 1 are — George W. Bush 2004 — has broken 48 percent since the 1992 election, and Dems have won more votes in seven of last eight presidential elections. If there is a party with a coalition problem, it is them, not us.

Our performance since Dobbs remains remarkable, and important. In 2022 we gained in AZ, CO, GA, MI, MN, NH, PA over 2020, getting to 59 percent in CO, 57 percent in PA, 55 percent in MI, 54 percent in NH in that "red wave" year. This year we've won and outperformed across the country in every kind of election, essentially leaving this a blue wave year.

We got to 56 percent in the WI SCOTUS race, 57 percent in Ohio, flipped Colorado Springs and Jacksonville, flipped the VA House, Kentucky Governor Andrew Beshear grew his margin, we won mayoralties and school board races across the United States. Elections are about winning and losing, and we keep winning and they keep losing.

In a recent post on his Substack, "Why I Am Optimistic About 2024," Rosenberg elaborated:

Opposition and fear of MAGA is the dominant force in USA Politics today, and that is a big problem for super-MAGA Trump in 2024. Fear and opposition to MAGA has been propelling our electoral wins since 2018, and will almost certainly do so again next year.

Alex Theodoridis, a political scientist at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, expressed similar optimism concerning Biden's chances: "Once Democrats come to terms with the fact that Biden will be the nominee (and, more importantly, that Trump will in all likelihood be the G. O. P. Nominee), a lot of the internal malaise expressed in current polls should dissipate. "

When Biden begins campaigning in earnest, Theodoridis wrote.

He will likely still come across as relatively competent and steady. And, while Trump always looms over G. O. P. Politics, we will certainly see more coverage of him as G. O. P. Nominee to remind less engaged Democrats and the few true independents that he is a deeply flawed figure who has and would again pose a real threat to our Republic.

When voters finally make up their minds, Theodoridis predicted, "The anti-MAGA, pro-democracy, pro-reproductive-rights message that has boosted turnout and served Democratic candidates well the last two Novembers will likely do so again. ".

Jim Kessler, a senior vice president of Third Way, a Democratic think tank, is nowhere near as confident in Democratic prospects as Rosenberg and Theodoridis are. In an email, Kessler observed that polls at this time need to be taken with a grain of salt — remarking that in 1991, George H. W. Bush appeared to be the prohibitive favorite to win a second term and that in 2011, Mitt Romney was well ahead of President Barack Obama.

In addition, Kessler wrote, in the past month.

The price of gasoline has fallen 20 cents to a national average of $3. 24 a gallon. Headline and core inflation have begun their final descent toward benign, historic levels. Interest rates have fallen about 40 basis points in the past several months. The so-called "misery index" (inflation + unemployment rate) could very well be at a level that is incumbent friendly.

That said, Kessler continued, there are clear danger signs:

Biden won in 2020 because he was perceived as having a more positive brand than the Democratic Party. That brand advantage over the Democratic Party is now gone. Exhibits A and be are crime and immigration. In 2020, Biden was perceived as tougher on crime and the border than the typical Democrat.

In one primary debate, Kessler pointed out.

Biden was the only candidate onstage not to raise his hand on a question that essentially could be interpreted as wanting open borders. He also loudly and repeatedly voiced his opposition to "defund the police" and never ran away from the 1994 crime bill that he authored in the Senate.

That, in Kessler's view, "is not the Joe Biden voters are hearing today. Voters actually hear almost nothing from the administration on crime or the border, and this allows the opposition to define them on an issue of great salience. ".

Biden, Kessler argued, has a credible record on tougher border enforcement and cracking down on crime, but he and other members of the administration don't promote it.

Because these are issues on which our active, progressive base is split. But if you are silent on these issues, it is like an admission of guilt to voters. They believe you do not care or are dismissive of their very real concerns. That means Biden must accept some griping from the left to get this story out to the vast middle.

Will Marshall, president and founder of the center-left Public Policy Institute think tank, responded to my query with an emailed question: "Trump is Kryptonite for American democracy, so why isn't President Biden leading him by 15 points?

Marshall's answer:

Biden's basic problem is that the Democratic Party keeps shrinking, leaving it with a drastically slender margin of error. It's losing working class voters — whites — by enormous, 30-point margins — but nonwhites without college degrees are slipping away too.

The ascendance of largely white, college-educated liberals within party ranks, in Marshall's view, has.

Pushed Democrats far to the dogmatic left, even as their base grows smaller. Young progressives have identified the party with stances on immigration, crime, gender, climate change and Palestinian resistance that are so far from mainstream sentiment that they can even eclipse MAGA extremism.

"Democrats," Marshall wrote, in a line of argument similar to Kessler's.

Have been aiming at the wrong target and have less than a year to adjust their sights. That means putting high prices and living costs front and center, embracing cultural pragmatism, confronting left-wing radicalism on the border, public safety and Israel and embracing a post-populist economics that speaks to working Americans' aspirations for growth and upward mobility rather than their presumed sense of economic victimhood.

Jacob Hacker, a political scientist at Yale, contended that the view of Biden and the Democratic Party as elitist and weak on the very values that were Democratic strengths in the past lacks foundation in practice. Instead, the adverse portrait of the Democrats represents a major success on the part of right-wing media — and a complicit mainstream media — in creating a false picture of the party.

In a forthcoming paper, "Bridging the Blue Divide: The Democrats' New Metro Coalition and the Unexpected Prominence of Redistribution," Hacker said he and three colleagues found that.

Democrats have not changed their orientation nearly as much as critics of the party argue. In particular, the party has not shifted its emphasis from economic to social / identity issues, nor has it moderated its economic positions overall. Instead, it has placed a high priority on an ambitious economic program that involves a wider range of policy aims and instruments than in the past (including industrial policy and pro-labor initiatives as well as social and health policies and public investments) as well as levels of public spending that dwarf those contemplated by party elites in at least a half century.

Why then, Hacker asked, is "the Democratic Party widely perceived to have abandoned pocketbook politics in favor of identity politics?

His answer:

Conservative media have relentlessly focused on this critique and there's strong evidence that media framing shapes how voters view the parties. Indeed, the role of the media in shaping the negative current climate — including more mainstream sources — should not be neglected. The obsessions of right-wing media with the "wokeness" of the Democratic Party seeps into the broader media coverage, and mainstream sources focus on criticisms of the Democrats, in part to uphold their nonpartisan ideal.

Ryan Enos, a political scientist at Harvard, warned that there are major consequences that could result from the weakness of Biden's support. In an email, Enos wrote:

There is no doubt that Democrats and — given that the likely Republican nominee is a would-be authoritarian — Americans more generally should be alarmed by Biden's poll numbers. He is saddled with the need to dig economic perceptions out of a deep inflationary hole, an unsteady international world and the view that his party went too far to the left on social issues.

If the election were held today, Enos argued, "Biden would likely lose. ".

During the campaign, "Biden's numbers will improve," Enos wrote, but Biden faces a large number of idealistic young voters who may.

Never come back to him because they believe that he has abandoned the core values that animated their support in the first place. Faced with the reality of surging immigration across the southern border, Biden has largely failed to liberalize his administration's approach to immigration — in fact, he has left much of the Trump era policies in place. To many young voters, who were first attracted to Biden's social progressivism, such moves may feel like a betrayal. Additionally, Biden has seemed to greenlight Israel's campaign of violence against civilians in Gaza. Especially for young voters of color, this seems like a betrayal and could cost Biden crucial states such as Michigan.

Jonathan Weiler, a political scientist at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, stands somewhere between Rosenberg and Marshall.

"There's no gainsaying Biden's poor polling numbers at the present," Weiler wrote by email:

However unhinged Trump appears increasingly to be, for now that's an abstraction for many voters. In the meantime, what they see in ways that feel up close and personal are signs of an unsettled and unsettling world impinging on their day to day lives, including inflation, higher crime and a big increase in migrants across our southern border and into cities around the United States.

On the plus side for Biden, Weiler wrote, "the data show clearly that inflation is trending substantially downward. " In addition.

Violent crime has returned to prepandemic levels. Americans always think crime is going up, no matter what the data say. But if the actual drop in crime results in people thinking about it less, that could also lessen people's sense of a chaotic and unsettled reality.

Rogers Smith, a political scientist at the University of Pennsylvania, made the case that Biden's age and his visible infirmities interfere with his ability to reassure the electorate:

The biggest factor that is neglected in many polls is the widespread belief that Biden is simply too old and insufficiently vigorous to remain president for four more years. This belief is reinforced by the reality that Biden does not inspire confidence in his vigor or energy in most of his public presentations. The problem is particularly acute among young voters but goes throughout the electorate, Democrats and Republicans alike. It means that voters don't give much weight to Biden's arguments on the issues.

Democrats are trapped, Smith maintained:

None will challenge Biden; he must choose to step aside. If he did so, he would feel compelled to support Kamala Harris. But most Democrats, and probably Biden himself, rightly believe that she would do even worse than he is doing.

The one ace in the hole for Democrats is Donald Trump himself. As the center of attention in the elections of 2018,2020 and even 2022, Trump was the key to Democratic victory. Trump is doing all he can to become the focus in 2024, but the question remains whether the Democrats, with Biden at the top of the ticket, can successfully demonize him again.

More on Biden's prospects for re-election.

Opinion.

Gail Collins and Bret Stephens.

There Are Politicians Who Lie More Than Is Strictly Necessary.

Dec. 4, 2023.

Opinion.

Charles M. Blow.

The 'Trump Isn't So Bad' Mind-Set.

Nov. 29,2023.

Opinion.

Thomas be. Edsall.

'The Longer and Bloodier the War, the Harder it Will Be for the Democratic Coalition'.

Nov. 8, 2023.

The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We'd like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips.

Follow the New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, X and Threads.

Thomas be. Edsall has been a contributor to the Times Opinion section since 2011. His column on strategic and demographic trends in American politics appears every Wednesday. He previously covered politics for The Washington Post. At edsall.

PURE FUCKING GOLD.

In an email, Greenberg summarized the results: "This is grim. " The study, he said, found that collectively, voters in the Democratic base of "Blacks, Hispanics, Asians, LGBTQ+ community, Gen Z, millennials, unmarried and college women give Trump higher approval ratings than Biden. ".

[Spidy]

Bridget Ziegler in a threesome! Nice!

https://www.yourobserver.com/news/20...rd-district-1/

Really...well I guess maybe, if Bridget-ba-duh, blonde bimbonic, "bi-gay", "bat-shit" crazy wifey, is your thing? ...then it would seem, you should look no further than Moms for Liberty (...kkkk!).

The woman who's accusing Christian Ziegler of rape was involved in a love triangle with him and his wife Bridget. She was upset when Ziegler showed up at her house without Bridget and had sex with her without a condom. She apparently had the hots for Bridget, not Christian. This may indeed be rape, or it may be another example of what Elvis has repeatedly cautioned us about: sex with bat shit crazy American women.

Yeah, you said it! Bridget Ziegler, founder of Moms for Liberty (MFL), is probably as "bat shit crazy", as she is a lying, two-faced hypocrite of the same "bat-shit" foul smelling magnitude.

But since it appears that husband, Christian Ziegler, head of the Florida GOP\Republican Party, is just as malodorous, they'll both enjoy more time basking in their "bat-shit crazy", LGBTQ and "bi-gay" hypocrite life-style, as Ronald DeSantis and Sen.Rick Scott (R-FL) calls for Ziegler's resignation.

Sen. Scott joins Gov. DeSantis in calling for resignation of Florida GOP chair amid rape investigation
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politic...-investigation

Although, perhaps when it comes to holding up pictures of "pieces of shit", to public scrutiny, Ronald "pudding fingers" DeSantis, could instead just hold up of a picture of the "bat-shit" crazy Zieglers?

Taking relationship advice from "Incel Elvis 2008", are we now? (...kkkk!) What's next, advice from MDS1? Where you'll be telling me, that since the Zieglers are a LGBTQ/bi-gay couple, they obviously "...just love to rape GIRLS and BOYS?"

And Since they may have already made the jump to "raping GIRLS", then by extension (according to MDS1 logic), one has to wonder...will reports of "BOYS being sexually abused"...soon follow?

And whatever will the moms at Moms for Liberty say? Can you imagine the "bat-shit crazy" talk and the things they'll be saying about their so called righteous leader, I've dubbed "the Ziegler Bi-sexual MILF, Blonde Bimbo, Betrayer of Moms for Liberty"?

This sex scandal, I hope, just rocks the Floridian GOP/Republican foundation to its book-banning, homophobic, hypocritical core. Ronald "pudding fingers" DeSantis, should worry about his own "real shit" to clean up!

[MarquisdeSade1]

Fighting satan aka the DNC and the deep state.

https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2...-defense-bill/

I think maybe, Mike Lee could be a great VP for King Trump 2024.

[EihTooms]

regarding jobs and wages.

The preceding doesn't seem reasonable to me.

I've had 5 or 6 Pfizer and Moderna shots and have never to my knowledge gotten COVID. That said, natural immunity from COVID infections may be more effective than the vaccines in preventing severe disease. Practically everyone's had the disease and / or the vaccine. We all have some immunity, and COVID's not nearly the threat it was. Finally, Paxlovid, which is readily available in the USA, is effective at preventing severe disease if taken soon after symptoms arise.

So, IF Trump were trying to convince people not to get vaccinated, the effect on public health probably wouldn't be significant. However, I don't think he's doing that. Trump encouraged people to get vaccinated. He was boo'ed at one of his rallies in Dallas for doing that. Since I don't buy into your prior explanations of how he caused the pandemic, this doesn't seem reasonable to me either.

As to the matter at hand, your sources are old. When corporations have more money to save, invest and spend in the private sector in the USA as a result of changes in the tax code, the effect isn't immediate. It's cumulative. If a company was paying tax at a rate of 40% of income (state + federal) before the tax cut and 26% afterwards, it has 14% more income available annually. That additional money is invested and otherwise recycled every year.

Your first source, an engineer writing in Forbes, says there were $2. 8 trillion stashed by USA Companies abroad which they hadn't brought back to the USA, in large part because, before the TCJA, they'd have to pay tax on the remittances. She says corporate buybacks were $200 billion more in the first three quarters of 2018, after the TCJA went into effect, than the first three quarters of 2017. Well, it's not uncommon for total S&P 500 buybacks to vary up or down by $200 billion a year. They were for example about $500 billion higher in the 12 months ending March 31 2022 versus the prior yearly period.

Second, if the $200 billion, or some larger amount went to buybacks, that's a good thing. It's money sitting in foreign bank accounts that's now largely sloshing around in the USA, being used for investments, savings and consumption here instead of elsewhere. The effect on our economy is positive.

Thirdly, Knott says that aggregate capital investment increased 8. 8% over 2017 while R&D investment grew 12.5%. That's not shabby at all, although for a single year, like the remittance, it's hard to say how much the TCJA had to do with that. Again, corporations don't change capital spending and other plans on a dime. It takes some time if you're going to build a new factory for example before you spend the money and hire the contractors.

Trump's instincts about the economy and business are better than at least 95% of Democratic Party politicians. But he's not the brightest bulb on the planet. I'd put his comments described in the Reuters article in the same category as his proposal to impose new across-the-board 10% tariffs into effect on imports. That doesn't make a lot of sense.

Gretchen Frazee, who wrote this, seems to write more about COVID than anything else. Women's sports is high on her agenda too. The survey in question kicked off on December 17 ,2018 and went to January 9, 2019. So again, given the changes took effect on January 1, 2018, that's not much time for corporations to change their hiring and investment.

Frazee writes, "Half of the survey's respondents from companies in the "goods-producing" sector which includes mining, construction and manufacturing said they accelerated investments because of the tax cuts. Twenty percent of companies in those industries said they redirected hiring and investment from foreign countries to the United States. ".

It would be interesting to see what the answers to the questions would have been a year later, in January, 2020. I don't see the TCJA addressed in the NABE's summary for that survey though.

That's probably a good thing. I don't believe it makes sense to mandate minimum wages at the national level. You wouldn't want it the same for Seattle and Jackson Mississippi for example. But yeah, it's great when more people are getting a living wage, without having to work 80 hours a week.

I don't believe these changes in 2020 made much of a difference, because so few people receive the minimum wage. At the national level, I'm reading something like 1. 9% of hourly workers get the federal minimum, and hourly workers are 55% of total workers. Yes, the percentage would be higher, taking into account state and local minimums. But still did this make a significant difference in median household income or average hourly wages? I'd suspect not. Anyway if you come across anything more detailed, it would be interesting to see.

Wasn't this your admission about your link not supporting the notion that Trump and his Repubs' TCJA measurably increased hiring or wages? And certainly not by 2020, the last year of Trump's so-called presidency and when his years' long efforts to identify and facilitate the inevitable Great Repub Economic Crash and Massive Jobs Destruction as is required of all Repub potuses came to fruition?

They estimate "a long-run increase in domestic corporate capital of roughly 7. 4% due to the TCJA's corporate provisions. " I'm not saying that means the changes in corporate taxation will necessarily increase the number of people employed by 7. 4% -- that would imply an unemployment rate of less than 0% if there's no increase in the labor force participation rate. But it darn sure means the corporate tax changes result in a decrease in unemployment and higher wages. They didn't quantify that in the paper, and in fact conclude by saying further research into the effect on income of workers as a result of the TCJA is warranted.

So then you nitpick over my link that substantiates unequivally that wages were raised and how they were raised in dozens of states and cities in 2020. Mostly blue states and blue cities, where the vast majority of the Labor Force of the United States of America reside anyway. LOL.

How does raising the minimum wage of a relatively small percent of the labor force matter to the overall increase in wages and bring more workers into the force?

Well, first of all it did it a damn sight better, more effectively and provably so than anything you have ever shown that idiotic TCJA did.

Second, raising the minimum wage for new, entry and lower level jobs will logically force employers to raise the wages of those who have been working for them for years in higher level, higher responsibility jobs. This generates a ripple effect. Similar to the ripple effect we all just saw the UAW create in the auto industry where even non union manufacturers had to up their game with their employees too or risk losing them. If a longer term and presumably more experienced and skilled employee can more easily walk away (those are called "quits" in the labor market) and start fresh at another company with at least some assurance that he / she will be paid a livable wage after the minimum wage has been raised, that employer had better start sweetening the deal for that level of worker as well.

See, this notion that Wingers conjure up to flatter their ego and sell that BS to the masses about that idiotic Repub Supply-Side / Trickle-Down tax and economic philosophy is "good" for lower and middle income earners too and not just applied to make it easier for CEOs to set aflame $1000 bills to light their cigars utterly misses the Real World detail that the last thing most major corporations and companies want to do is hire more employees. They do so when they HAVE TO if it looks like they will not have plenty of those $1000 bill cigar lighters in their future unless they do. Just because Trump and every other Repub puts extra cash in their pocket does not inspire them to hire one more American with it.

LOL. So Trump dared to reverse his pitch that getting a vaccine is unnecessary, naturally got booed for it by his cult followers who never heard him utter such a thing before, and that so terrified him he never uttered it in public again.

Meanwhile:

New COVID Strain May Evade Vaccines, Alarming Health Officials.
Aug. 24, 2023

https://www.webmd.com/covid/news/202...alth-officials

Yep, if Trump, his cult followers in and out of the Repub Pink Now Smaller Tinkle House and Senate, DeSantis. RFK Jr and Bill Maher can see to it that just 50,000 - 60,000 more Americans die from Trump's Pandrmic by mocking or denigrating known mitigation and vaccine efforts, they will have successfully Mass Murdered more Americans than were killed in all the military conflicts since and including the Civil War.

[Tiny 12]

Florida Repub Party Chairman (FRPC) and his wife the head of Mom's for Liberty, accused of Sexual Battery and Rape.

Florida GOP chair under investigation related to sexual battery allegation
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/pol...ery-rcna127430

Let's be clear, Christian and Bridget Ziegler couple, are seen as one of architects of the Mom's for Liberty movement, responsible for going around Florida banning LGTBQ books (among others), Storybook Hour and the myriad of lies, accusing liberals of being "groomers" and "pedophiles".

Meanwhile, they're engaging in their very own LGBTQ sex tryst going on for 3-years, that has now ended in a very public case of rape, sexual abuse, battery and harassment. The 13-page
allegations, appear to be very strong and credible, sources report.

The Florida Repub Party Chairman and right-wing Mom's for Liberty movement, must be the American "cesspool", dear old House Speaker Rep.Mike Johnson (R-LA), was praying for God, to rid America off?

Bridget Ziegler in a threesome! Nice!

https://www.yourobserver.com/news/20...rd-district-1/

The woman who's accusing Christian Ziegler of rape was involved in a love triangle with him and his wife Bridget. She was upset when Ziegler showed up at her house without Bridget and had sex with her without a condom. She apparently had the hots for Bridget, not Christian. This may indeed be rape, or it may be another example of what Elvis has repeatedly cautioned us about: sex with bat shit crazy American women.

[Tiny 12]

Of course tax cuts actually do matter. Dem tax cuts and stewardship produce historic recoveries, meaningful economic expansion and historic job gains while Repub tax cuts and stewardship produce massive job losses, Great Depressions, Great Recessions and skyrocketing deficits.

That is one of the main reasons I have voted Dem straight down every ballot, never for a Repub and never for another Party candidate for any office since the middle of Reagan's first so-called presidential term.

Aside from those TCJA Corporate Tax Cuts being turned right around into stock buy-backs and NOT into creating a meaningful number of jobs, Trump's only other "accomplishment" in his 4 years as so-called president was spending 2018,2019 and 2020 making sure America and the rest of the world was left bare-ass naked against the emergence and spread of a deadly airborn virus that so far has killed almost as many Americans as were killed in The Civil War, WWI, WWII, The Korean War and Ike's Vietnam War COMBINED.

The preceding doesn't seem reasonable to me.

If he continues to convince any idiot who believes him that vaccines are not necessary to combat whatever new mutation of Trump's Pandemic virus developes over the next couple of years it is possible the number of Americans he will have Mass Murdered due to his horrific economic and national security policies and stewardship will far surpass all the number of American deaths in every military conflict since the Republican Party was conjured up in the mid 1850's.

I've had 5 or 6 Pfizer and Moderna shots and have never to my knowledge gotten COVID. That said, natural immunity from COVID infections may be more effective than the vaccines in preventing severe disease. Practically everyone's had the disease and / or the vaccine. We all have some immunity, and COVID's not nearly the threat it was. Finally, Paxlovid, which is readily available in the USA, is effective at preventing severe disease if taken soon after symptoms arise.

So, IF Trump were trying to convince people not to get vaccinated, the effect on public health probably wouldn't be significant. However, I don't think he's doing that. Trump encouraged people to get vaccinated. He was boo'ed at one of his rallies in Dallas for doing that. Since I don't buy into your prior explanations of how he caused the pandemic, this doesn't seem reasonable to me either.

Why The Tax Cuts And Jobs Act (TCJA) Led To Buybacks Rather Than Investment

https://www.forbes.com/sites/annemar...h=455e5a2e37fb

As to the matter at hand, your sources are old. When corporations have more money to save, invest and spend in the private sector in the USA as a result of changes in the tax code, the effect isn't immediate. It's cumulative. If a company was paying tax at a rate of 40% of income (state + federal) before the tax cut and 26% afterwards, it has 14% more income available annually. That additional money is invested and otherwise recycled every year.

Your first source, an engineer writing in Forbes, says there were $2. 8 trillion stashed by USA Companies abroad which they hadn't brought back to the USA, in large part because, before the TCJA, they'd have to pay tax on the remittances. She says corporate buybacks were $200 billion more in the first three quarters of 2018, after the TCJA went into effect, than the first three quarters of 2017. Well, it's not uncommon for total S&P 500 buybacks to vary up or down by $200 billion a year. They were for example about $500 billion higher in the 12 months ending March 31 2022 versus the prior yearly period.

Second, if the $200 billion, or some larger amount went to buybacks, that's a good thing. It's money sitting in foreign bank accounts that's now largely sloshing around in the USA, being used for investments, savings and consumption here instead of elsewhere. The effect on our economy is positive.

Thirdly, Knott says that aggregate capital investment increased 8. 8% over 2017 while R&D investment grew 12.5%. That's not shabby at all, although for a single year, like the remittance, it's hard to say how much the TCJA had to do with that. Again, corporations don't change capital spending and other plans on a dime. It takes some time if you're going to build a new factory for example before you spend the money and hire the contractors.

Trump slams companies for using U.S. tax credit to buy back stocks

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-h...idUSKBN2173HY/

Trump's instincts about the economy and business are better than at least 95% of Democratic Party politicians. But he's not the brightest bulb on the planet. I'd put his comments described in the Reuters article in the same category as his proposal to impose new across-the-board 10% tariffs into effect on imports. That doesn't make a lot of sense.

Did Trumps tax cuts boost hiring? Most companies say no

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/economy...mpanies-say-no

Gretchen Frazee, who wrote this, seems to write more about COVID than anything else. Women's sports is high on her agenda too. The survey in question kicked off on December 17 ,2018 and went to January 9, 2019. So again, given the changes took effect on January 1, 2018, that's not much time for corporations to change their hiring and investment.

Frazee writes, "Half of the survey's respondents from companies in the "goods-producing" sector which includes mining, construction and manufacturing said they accelerated investments because of the tax cuts. Twenty percent of companies in those industries said they redirected hiring and investment from foreign countries to the United States. ".

It would be interesting to see what the answers to the questions would have been a year later, in January, 2020. I don't see the TCJA addressed in the NABE's summary for that survey though.

24 states will raise the minimum wage in 2020

https://www.cnn.com/2019/12/28/us/mi...rnd/index.html

That's probably a good thing. I don't believe it makes sense to mandate minimum wages at the national level. You wouldn't want it the same for Seattle and Jackson Mississippi for example. But yeah, it's great when more people are getting a living wage, without having to work 80 hours a week.

I don't believe these changes in 2020 made much of a difference, because so few people receive the minimum wage. At the national level, I'm reading something like 1. 9% of hourly workers get the federal minimum, and hourly workers are 55% of total workers. Yes, the percentage would be higher, taking into account state and local minimums. But still did this make a significant difference in median household income or average hourly wages? I'd suspect not. Anyway if you come across anything more detailed, it would be interesting to see.

[Spidy]

Florida Repub Party Chairman (FRPC) and his wife the head of Mom's for Liberty, accused of Sexual Battery and Rape.

Florida GOP chair under investigation related to sexual battery allegation
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/pol...ery-rcna127430

Let's be clear, Christian and Bridget Ziegler couple, are seen as one of architects of the Mom's for Liberty movement, responsible for going around Florida banning LGTBQ books (among others), Storybook Hour and the myriad of lies, accusing liberals of being "groomers" and "pedophiles".

Meanwhile, they're engaging in their very own LGBTQ sex tryst going on for 3-years, that has now ended in a very public case of rape, sexual abuse, battery and harassment. The 13-page
allegations, appear to be very strong and credible, sources report.

The Florida Repub Party Chairman and right-wing Mom's for Liberty movement, must be the American "cesspool", dear old House Speaker Rep.Mike Johnson (R-LA), was praying for God, to rid America off?

[EihTooms]

You're a smart guy but you overemphasize trends and just look at one variable in trying to explain GDP growth, employment and the like: the party of the president. Please note I said PART of the reason were the changes in corporate taxation and deregulation. As I've mentioned countless times, external events (for example oil shocks and a pandemic), globalization, changes in technology, demographic changes and Fed policy have more influence on the economy than the president. Still I don't think the unemployment rate would have been as low or middle class wages would have been as high at the start of COVID, or at the end of Trump's presidency, or today if not for the corporate tax changes. And deregulation helped too.

This graph of real median household income is interesting too.

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEHOINUSA672N

When COVID hit the workingman was finally making gains. He was treading water from 2000 to 2015, but then income popped upwards. COVID though intervened, and then high inflation in goods and services outpaced wage gains, and we gave a lot of it back.

You want to know why wages were increasing and the workingman was finally making gains when Trump's efforts in 2018,2019 and all through 2020 finally produced Trump's Pandemic and all of the worldwide economic fallout from it?

Here is why. And it not only had nothing to do with his and his Party's idiotic TCJA. It had everything to do with something Repubs generally OPPOSE:

Trumps disappearing populism was on full display at Thursdays debate.
From the minimum wage to taxes, hes a boring Republican now.

https://www.vox.com/2020/10/22/21529...um-wage-debate

24 states will raise the minimum wage in 2020

https://www.cnn.com/2019/12/28/us/mi...rnd/index.html

On New Years Day, 20 states and 26 cities and counties, mostly in California, will raise the minimum wages. Four more states and 23 more cities and counties will join later in the year, according to NELP.

These increases will put much-needed money into the hands of the lowest-paid workers, many of whom struggle with high and ever-increasing costs of living, wrote researcher and policy analyst Yannet Lathrop in a blog post announcing the new wages.

[EihTooms]

Nothing "whatsoever done, thought, said, proposed, passed or farted by Donald J. Trump"? Au contraire. See this recent paper from the National Bureau of Economic Research, authored by economists from Harvard, Princeton, the University of Chicago and the Treasury Department.

https://conference.nber.org/conf_papers/f191672.pdf

They estimate "a long-run increase in domestic corporate capital of roughly 7. 4% due to the TCJA's corporate provisions. " I'm not saying that means the changes in corporate taxation will necessarily increase the number of people employed by 7. 4% -- that would imply an unemployment rate of less than 0% if there's no increase in the labor force participation rate. But it darn sure means the corporate tax changes result in a decrease in unemployment and higher wages. They didn't quantify that in the paper, and in fact conclude by saying further research into the effect on income of workers as a result of the TCJA is warranted.

Another interesting conclusion is that by the end of the 10 year budget window (by 2028), the effect of corporate revenue gains and higher labor taxes (as a result of higher employment and wages) offset the drop in the corporate rate. In the long term, everybody wins. The corporations generate higher revenues, there are more jobs and higher pay, and the blood suckers in Washington, D.C., while losing revenue during the early years after the cut, end up even at the end of 10 years.

Democrat economist Jason Furman is convinced:

"The new study has economists buzzing on the platform formerly known as Twitter. "These are the most convincing estimates of the response of investment to corporate tax rates that I've ever seen," says Harvard's Jason Furman, former chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers during the Obama administration. He is not among the study authors but describes the findings in a series of posts on X:

Taxes actually do matter. Companies that saw larger reductions in tax rates from the TCJA also experienced larger increases in investment in the years that followed. ".

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-tru...orked-7670b723

Of course tax cuts actually do matter. Dem tax cuts and stewardship produce historic recoveries, meaningful economic expansion and historic job gains while Repub tax cuts and stewardship produce massive job losses, Great Depressions, Great Recessions and skyrocketing deficits.

That is one of the main reasons I have voted Dem straight down every ballot, never for a Repub and never for another Party candidate for any office since the middle of Reagan's first so-called presidential term.

Aside from those TCJA Corporate Tax Cuts being turned right around into stock buy-backs and NOT into creating a meaningful number of jobs, Trump's only other "accomplishment" in his 4 years as so-called president was spending 2018,2019 and 2020 making sure America and the rest of the world was left bare-ass naked against the emergence and spread of a deadly airborn virus that so far has killed almost as many Americans as were killed in The Civil War, WWI, WWII, The Korean War and Ike's Vietnam War COMBINED.

If he continues to convince any idiot who believes him that vaccines are not necessary to combat whatever new mutation of Trump's Pandemic virus developes over the next couple of years it is possible the number of Americans he will have Mass Murdered due to his horrific economic and national security policies and stewardship will far surpass all the number of American deaths in every military conflict since the Republican Party was conjured up in the mid 1850's.

Why The Tax Cuts And Jobs Act (TCJA) Led To Buybacks Rather Than Investment

https://www.forbes.com/sites/annemar...h=455e5a2e37fb

Trump slams companies for using U.S. tax credit to buy back stocks

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-h...idUSKBN2173HY/

Did Trumps tax cuts boost hiring? Most companies say no

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/economy...mpanies-say-no

[Tiny 12]

You're a smart guy but you overemphasize trends and just look at one variable in trying to explain GDP growth, employment and the like: the party of the president. Please note I said PART of the reason were the changes in corporate taxation and deregulation.As I've mentioned countless times, external events (for example oil shocks and a pandemic), globalization, changes in technology, demographic changes and Fed policy have more influence on the economy than the president. Still I don't think the unemployment rate would have been as low or middle class wages would have been as high at the start of COVID, or at the end of Trump's presidency, or today if not for the corporate tax changes. And deregulation helped too.

Any intelligent person can look at those links and charts and immediately see that NONE of the Real Wage Growth and NONE of the Unemployment Rate Declnes could possibly have been "caused" by anything whatsoever done, thought, said, proposed, passed or farted by Donald J. Trump. Which is the BS you tried to float, apparently assuming only representatives of Fux, Newsmax, Breitbart, NYT, CNN, MSNBC, ABC News, NBC News, CBS News and Bill Maher himself would read it and happily allow you to get away with it.

Sorry.

Trump's Pandemic, that Recession in the grey area of the chart when, naturally, prices for almost everything no one had access to anyway plunged and that huge spike in the Unemployment Rate, yes, you can give Trump all the credit you want for those. I give him at least 90% credit for them.

But those other beautifully positive trajectories that were already rock solid steamrolling for YEARS prior and into his first couple of years in office, nope.

Nothing "whatsoever done, thought, said, proposed, passed or farted by Donald J. Trump"? Au contraire. See this recent paper from the National Bureau of Economic Research, authored by economists from Harvard, Princeton, the University of Chicago and the Treasury Department.

https://conference.nber.org/conf_papers/f191672.pdf

They estimate "a long-run increase in domestic corporate capital of roughly 7. 4% due to the TCJA's corporate provisions. " I'm not saying that means the changes in corporate taxation will necessarily increase the number of people employed by 7. 4% -- that would imply an unemployment rate of less than 0% if there's no increase in the labor force participation rate. But it darn sure means the corporate tax changes result in a decrease in unemployment and higher wages. They didn't quantify that in the paper, and in fact conclude by saying further research into the effect on income of workers as a result of the TCJA is warranted.

Another interesting conclusion is that by the end of the 10 year budget window (by 2028), the effect of corporate revenue gains and higher labor taxes (as a result of higher employment and wages) offset the drop in the corporate rate. In the long term, everybody wins. The corporations generate higher revenues, there are more jobs and higher pay, and the blood suckers in Washington, D.C., while losing revenue during the early years after the cut, end up even at the end of 10 years.

Democrat economist Jason Furman is convinced:

"The new study has economists buzzing on the platform formerly known as Twitter. "These are the most convincing estimates of the response of investment to corporate tax rates that I've ever seen," says Harvard's Jason Furman, former chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers during the Obama administration. He is not among the study authors but describes the findings in a series of posts on X:

Taxes actually do matter. Companies that saw larger reductions in tax rates from the TCJA also experienced larger increases in investment in the years that followed. ".

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-tru...orked-7670b723

[EihTooms]

You're a smart guy but you overemphasize trends and just look at one variable in trying to explain GDP growth, employment and the like: the party of the president. Please note I said PART of the reason were the changes in corporate taxation and deregulation. As I've mentioned countless times, external events (for example oil shocks and a pandemic), globalization, changes in technology, demographic changes and Fed policy have more influence on the economy than the president. Still I don't think the unemployment rate would have been as low or middle class wages would have been as high at the start of COVID, or at the end of Trump's presidency, or today if not for the corporate tax changes. And deregulation helped too.

This graph of real median household income is interesting too.

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEHOINUSA672N

When COVID hit the workingman was finally making gains. He was treading water from 2000 to 2015, but then income popped upwards. COVID though intervened, and then high inflation in goods and services outpaced wage gains, and we gave a lot of it back.

Any intelligent person can look at those links and charts and immediately see that NONE of the Real Wage Growth and NONE of the Unemployment Rate Declnes could possibly have been "caused" by anything whatsoever done, thought, said, proposed, passed or farted by Donald J. Trump. Which is the BS you tried to float, apparently assuming only representatives of Fux, Newsmax, Breitbart, NYT, CNN, MSNBC, ABC News, NBC News, CBS News and Bill Maher himself would read it and happily allow you to get away with it.

Sorry.

Trump's Pandemic, that Recession in the grey area of the chart when, naturally, prices for almost everything no one had access to anyway plunged and that huge spike in the Unemployment Rate, yes, you can give Trump all the credit you want for those. I give him at least 90% credit for them.

But those other beautifully positive trajectories that were already rock solid steamrolling for YEARS prior and into his first couple of years in office, nope.

[Tiny 12]

Uh. Real Weekly Wages. That would be adjusted for inflation, right?

Real Weekly Wages were already climbing in an upward trajectory under Obama-Biden YEARS before Trump's one and only economic "stimulus" legislation went into effect in 2018. And the only reason there was a momentary spike in that "adjusted for inflation" part of it in early 2020 was because prices of everything else were crashing due to Trump's Pandemic. Yeah, anyone who still had a job that paid wages could buy gas really, really cheap and not go anywhere thanks to Trump's necessary closures at the time. See link and screenshot below:

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LES1252881600Q

Uh. The unemployment rate had been declining steadily and dramatically under Obama-Biden YEARS before Trump's one and only economic "stimulus" legislation went into effect in 2018. Oh, and please note the gigantic spike in the unemployment rate right about the same time those "adjusted for inflation" wages some lucky few were still receiving momentarily spiked up after Trump's other decisions in 2018 and 2019 and his lying about it all through 2020 created and exacerbated Trump's Pandemic. See link and screenshot below:

https://www.bls.gov/charts/employmen...yment-rate.htm

You have a truly bizarre concept of "cause and effect" that seems to find a "cause" for things under Trump / Repubs that came into "effect" YEARS earlier after Dems shouldered all the heavy lifting and assumed all the political risk to make it happen.

As is so very common among Repubs anyway. And the saddest part is that you Repubs continually attribute those Dem acheivements you're always taking credit for to the very Repub tax policies, lax enforcement of regulations and horrible economic stewardship that has plunged America into every Great Depression, Great Recession, Massive Jobs Destruction and NONE of the Great Recoveries, Historic Expansions and Historic Job Gains of the past 100 years or so.

It is truly astonishing but understandable why typically pro Repub Mainstream Media let you get away with it.

You're a smart guy but you overemphasize trends and just look at one variable in trying to explain GDP growth, employment and the like: the party of the president. Please note I said PART of the reason were the changes in corporate taxation and deregulation. As I've mentioned countless times, external events (for example oil shocks and a pandemic), globalization, changes in technology, demographic changes and Fed policy have more influence on the economy than the president. Still I don't think the unemployment rate would have been as low or middle class wages would have been as high at the start of COVID, or at the end of Trump's presidency, or today if not for the corporate tax changes. And deregulation helped too.

This graph of real median household income is interesting too.

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEHOINUSA672N

When COVID hit the workingman was finally making gains. He was treading water from 2000 to 2015, but then income popped upwards. COVID though intervened, and then high inflation in goods and services outpaced wage gains, and we gave a lot of it back.