Sanders Economic Plan Is Puppies And Rainbows
The Sanders economic plan is colorful and cute, but certainly not real.
The American Economic Association, an organization of working economists in academia, business, government, international and not-for-profit agencies, defines economics as the study of how people choose to use resources. Economics includes the study of labor, land, and investments, money, income, production, taxes and government expenditures. Economists seek to measure well-being, to learn how well-being may increase over time, and to evaluate the well-being of the rich and the poor.
Choices involve how much time to devote to work, school, and leisure, how many dollars to spend and how many to save, how to combine resources to produce goods and services, and how to vote and shape the level of taxes and the role of government. Resources include the time and talent people have available, the land, buildings, equipment, and other tools on hand, and the knowledge of how to combine them to create useful products and services.
Well-being includes the satisfaction people gain from the products and services they choose to consume, from their time spent in leisure and with family and community as well as in jobs, and the security and services provided by effective governments. People use their resources in ways that either improve or don’t improve their well-being.
Although the behavior of individuals is important, economics also addresses the collective behavior of business, industry, government, and the world. Microeconomics starts by thinking about how individuals make decisions. Macroeconomics considers aggregate outcomes. The two points of view are essential in understanding most economic phenomena.
Council of Economic Advisors
The Council of Economic Advisers, an agency within the Executive Office of the President, is charged with offering the President objective economic advice on the formulation of both domestic and international economic policy. The Council bases its recommendations and analysis on economic research and empirical evidence, using the best data available to support the President in setting our nation’s economic policy. The Council is supported by a staff of professional senior economists, staff economists and research assistants, as well as a statistical office.
Sanders Economic Plan
Four former chairs of the White House Council of Economic Advisers have published the following letter rebuking the Sanders economic plan, campaign and Gerald Friedman, an economist at UMass Amherst who recently put out a 53-page analysis of the Sanders tax and health care plans, for making unrealistic assumptions that “no credible economic research supports.” Friedman’s analysis showed that the Sanders single-payer health care plan in particular would have an ridiculously amazing effect on the economy.
Friedman’s specific analysis projects that median household income would increase to more than $80,000 per year by 2026 (currently $53,657 so an increase or a 33% increase in median income over a 10 year period), the economy would grow by 5.3 percent (currently, we are growing at 2.5%), and unemployment would fall to 3.8 percent (currently 4.9%). Friedman said his projections show the U.S. returning to the growth rates of the 1960s, and to the labor force participation rates of the late 1990s.
Bernie’s agenda in total could increase the size of the federal government by 50 percent. That level would surpass any government expansion since the buildup in World War II. Quite simply, his assumptions are wildly optimistic, and his health plane will cost $27 trillion, not $14 trillion,, which would put total spending for all of his initiatives above $30 trillion through 2026.
The New York Times remarks how Sanders has described his health care plan as “Medicare for All,” but it would be more generous, giving Americans broader coverage without premiums, deductibles or co-payments. It would replace not only Medicare but also Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program.
A table in his economic adviser’s analysis shows that all public spending currently going to military, veterans’, American Indian and other health programs would be part of the financing for his single-payer plan, yet veterans’ and American Indian health programs would apparently remain intact. That suggests double-counting, or financing the existing programs while claiming the sums to offset the single-payer plan. He hasn’t address military benefits.
Sanders economic plan will only add $2 trillion to $3 trillion a year on average to federal spending; by comparison, total federal spending is projected to be above $4 trillion in the next president’s first year. In other words, the numbers don’t add up unless one believes having the government provide more services will cost less.
On his campaign website, Mr. Sanders proposes more than $18 trillion in new spending over 10 years; he does not account for some ideas he favors, like universal prekindergarten and child care, that could put the total above $20 trillion. About $14 trillion of the total is for health care; the rest is chiefly for infrastructure, free college, Social Security, paid family leave and clean-energy initiatives.
You want higher taxes on the wealthy and businesses? So does Hillary except her estimates would cost an additional $100 billion a year, or $1.2 trillion over 10 years. The math adds up too.
Bernie’s plan includes a new, across-the-board 2.2 percent income tax. Ultimately, middle-class taxpayers would pay more for the European-style social welfare state that is the Sanders economic plan.
