We all know that Democratic Presidents are invariably better for the economy than Republicans. Every time anyone pulls the statistics out and analyzes them, the story comes out the same. But Kevin Drum has gotten some new results in addition.
A second point is that Democratic Presidents do better for the economy every year except the year of the election. Republican Presidents have better economies in the year they are elected.
OK. New one to me. Still, I think that Republicans are intellectually tied into "trickle down economics", largely because they believe that hierarchies are the more efficient form of economic organization and that bigger business organizations are better. The two are connected to the idea that social success occurs because the elite makes it happen, and the elite makes it happen more if they are rewarded financially to a greater extent. Because of this Republicans work harder to understand and practice leadership than they do to understand what really makes each business successful. So they operate on the idea that it is more important to select and motivate leaders than it is to look out to the masses of people and find out who is doing the best job, then bring them into the business. [Yeah, yeah. Oversimplification here. I am actually presenting the two endpoints of a continuum.]
Democrats on the other hand are more interested in how the workers operate. They then select, train and reward the actual workers rather then leaders. Looking at Kevin Drums numbers, this would spread the rewards out to more than just the leaders, and would get a lot more input on how to do the job better from the people who are actually doing the job. The effect of this would be to increase economic productivity while spreading the rewards to most workers. Exactly the effects Kevin describes.
But why do Republican Presidents get better economic performance in election years? My best guess is that they pander to a much wider range of people during those years and do things to get elected that their conservative philosophies would not consider effective economically. That's the only idea I have, and I feel that it is weaker than the party characteristics I described above. I just don't have any better idea.
Anyone else have any ideas? Comments are working here. Try them out.
1 comment:
Yeah, here's an idea: economic impact is anything but immediate. Maybe, just maybe, Clinton's technology boom (the driving force behind the good economy) had something to do with the groundwork laid by 12 years of Republican presidents in advance of him? And maybe, just maybe Bush 43's recession, which, by the way, began before he took office, had something to do with what happened under Clinton as well as the natural end of that tech bubble?
Hmmmm... unless, of course, you believe that a President has immediate impact on the economy, which I find very tough to swallow.
In fact, let's go back and take a look at the first four years of FDR's presidency... NIGHTMARE economy, not improving. You give him some time (and a World War) and the economy turns around—but it was anything but immediate.
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