Funny Republicans argued with us for years and now you guys are basically siding with a guy who agrees with us. Glad to see you've come back towards the center from the far far right.
Donald Trump Just Contradicted Everything Republicans Have Said About The Economy For 8 Years
I mean, they were wrong. But still.
Donald Trump said something... true?
“Well sometimes you have to prime the pump,”
The point is that with his talk of “priming the pump,” Trump appears to be embracing the version of Keynesian economic theory that has dominated American policymaking since World War II.
The idea is pretty simple: When the economy gets into a rut, the government can get it out by spending money. Hiring workers to fix bridges and paint schoolhouses puts money in their pockets, which they can, in turn, go out and spend on other goods. Retailers can thus afford to employ workers to sell those goods, who in turn can spend their pay on other things, and off we go. The economy grows.
Republicans have made a show of rejecting this idea since President Barack Obamatook office in 2009. House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and others have insisted that government spending is economic poison, and that a responsible government can somehow cut its way to growth. This is what much of Europe has been trying to do since the financial crisis, with lousyeconomic (and political) results.
Trump has talked like a Keynesian before. During the campaign, he vowed to implement a $550 billion infrastructure project, and basically said he would borrow money to pay for it. That’s what Obama did with his 2009 stimulus package, but Republicans voted against it, denounced it and insisted the country was headed for a “debt crisis” that never actually materialized.
Conservatives condemn big budget deficits and government spending when Democrats are in power, but they tend to govern as militarist Keynesians, slashing taxes and spending big on defense. “Reagan proved that deficits don’t matter,” Vice President Dick Cheney once said, while pursuing exactly those policies, which Ryan voted for.
