It’s the Economy, Stupid

By Martin H. Levinson

To be elected president you need to propose economic policies that will attract voters who, like all people, want to get as much as possible without having to consider the consequences. Half-measures won’t do, which is why Harris and Trump should think about the following proposals.

Trump is advocating a 15% tax on capital gains, Harris 28%. Both numbers are way too high. If they are serious about winning votes the best policy would be to promise no tax on capital gains, a quite reasonable position, as taxing stock-market profits penalizes people who had the brains to bet on companies that know how to make money. The government should be incentivizing that sort of behavior, not punishing it.

They could also promise to compensate people who lose money in the market, as the fact they were in the market shows they have faith in capitalism. To motivate people to stay in the market one could propose that the government make good on stock-market losses. One could call this policy “Trickle Up Economics.”

Lots of folks don’t get college degrees, as education has become unaffordable. To solve that problem the government could simply issue degrees. The quickest way to do that would be to have the Feds mail out diplomas to anyone who asked for one. This would not only save people money it would save people time, since those who desire college degrees wouldn’t have to waste years of their life trying to get one. Once they got their degrees, people could do what people did for thousands of years before the invention of the baccalaureate: learn on the job.

Giving child tax credits is a great way to win votes but one could go further. Rather than just tax credits, families with children could be exempted from paying taxes altogether. Besides being a popular vote-getter, this policy would encourage people to have children, reverse US population decline, and be a boon for toy, doll and crib manufacturers. To assuage childless cat ladies who might feel slighted they were not benefiting from such tax relief one could also propose tax credits for people with pets hanging about the house.

Speaking of houses, there is a shortage of them in the United States and neither party has a good plan to solve this problem. But it’s not about a plan. It’s about giving hope to people who want a piece of the American Dream. Such hope can be offered by promising to build a house for every man, woman, other-gendered individual, and child living in America  who desires a house and having that edifice built wherever a person desired it. Financing could be done through government bonds  issued by the government to the government and payable back to the government when it had the money.

Americans want low-priced goods made by Americans, which is why it makes sense to place high tariffs on goods coming in from abroad. How high? Five-thousand percent high, a number that would guarantee keeping cheap foreign crap from our shores. To spice up this policy, one could advocate a rebate plan, whereby if a consumer found a foreign-made product less expensive than the price the consumer paid for the domestic one, the government would issue a refund for triple the difference. The program could be labeled “The American Patriot Discount Act.”

There are tons of other vote-getting economic policies that candidates could pitch. To wit, abolishing the IRS, issuing ten-thousand-dollar checks to people on their birthdays, and offering a once-a-year, two-week, government-paid vacation to Disney World. They say there is no such thing as a free lunch, and that may be true. But they don’t say there is no such thing as promising free lunches. Isn’t that what political campaigns are really all about?