Adapt or Die

“The gap between how the economy actually works and how we’d like it to work is a breeding ground for discontent and desperate policy agendas. For our economic ills, Trump blames foreigners — immigrants and imports — along with the American officials who, over the years and according to Trump, engineered disastrous policies.”  (Washington Post Opinion Page July 23, 2018).  

This is the basic paradigm problem.  Baby boomers and their children, all now in middle age, remember the “good ole days” when the economy boomed.  I remember In Redding California, my home town, lumber was king, salaries went up, people traded up houses, constantly getting bigger (which was supposedly better) 

The country embarked on a gluttony of spending that used up resources at a record rate.

Taxes went up, but people made enough money in raises to offset them.  Nobody told us that the high tax rate on the rich was to help pay off WWII and pay for the defense spending of the Cold War, the rich were making so much money that it didn’t matter.

It took Europe and Asia about forty years to rebuild their industries.  When they did, in the mid seventies, the growth in America started to slow, as cheaper imports took over the market place.  One recession after another started, upending the political process as the party not in party used the economy to win elections.  A cycle of failure with brief successes ensued that continues to this day.  

And America swung right, into fascism, from this cycle of boom and bust (mostly bust).  And the cause, the WAR of course, it, just like WWI before it, which caused WWII.  The dislocations of war, that America had missed, was vested on it after the European and Asians economies were rebuilt.  Suddenly the shoe was on the other foot, as cheap products from Asia flooded American markets.  I remember when refrigerators were outsourced to Mexico shutting down factories in the mid-west.  

And Trump was elected to Make America Great Again.  That is impossible since the paradigm has changed.  The global economy has put America in its place, not the top dog anymore, still a powerful economic engine, but not alone.  

It’s 1970 all over again, when Reagan used this simple paradigm change to come to power, overturn high taxes, raise defense spending, and sparking yet another recession and a huge budget deficit.

And still nobody tells the American People the truth:  It’s the damn wars and their aftermath that cause economic problems.  It take years to get over it, and the distribution of global wealth is redistributed when countries rebuild, with new infrastructure and new ideas.

For example, health care;  after WWII Europe and Asia’s health care systems were in shambles...Doctors had been killed in the war, hospitals destroyed (sometimes on purpose).

To deal with this crisis, most European countries experimented with socialized medicine, or single payer systems, that spread a cheaper and more manageable system of universal health care to the population.   In many cases, like Japan for example, this was necessary to deal with widespread burns and even radiation sickness.  

America meanwhile, whose infrastructure was complete intact, stayed with the private medical system, that worked for awhile, until the inflation of post-war America drove health care and pharmaceutical prices through the roof.

So now, America’s economy is stifled by high health care costs in a system that literally rations health care toward the rich.  

Moreover, a deep and resistant poverty hit America, with rampant homelessness recently, reducing the once “shining city on the hill” to a land of panhandling.

And of course, a politician was ready to take advantage of it:  Donald Trump and the Republicans.  

First thing they did was to pass a tax cut, claiming high corporate taxes were the problem of equal distribution of wealth.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  And this will only exacerbate the inequities that are causing the widespread poverty in the first place.

Meanwhile the rest of the world, who are lengthening the lead they have over United States in the critical area of efficient use of renewable resources, are distancing themselves from the “sick giant of America”.

And the quick fix, the momentary solution, that gets demagogues elected works, putting Republicans (the party of Depression by the way) into power yet again, and like the 1920s, overspending, setting the economy up on bets and gambles, and setting us up for yet another  Depression.

And the cycle continues because nobody will tell the American People the truth and if they do tell the truth they are punished by the voters, who keep looking for the “good ole days”.

The good ole days don’t exist anymore.  The world has created a climate change situation, that is the number one threat to survival.  And many countries, especially those who had to rebuild after WWII, get it and are installing more and more renewable energy sources and using cars less and less.

The United States: well we are stuck in the past, still gauging our leaderships by gasoline prices and refusing to adapt to the new paradigm:  global economy competition, new health care paradigm, and finally the need to spread the wealth and adopt policies that help not hurt the “losers” in the new world economy.  Moreover, those countries that adapt to global climate change and the peak oil, that is hitting us right now, will at least survive; those that don’t adapt (the United States is the biggest denier) will NOT SURVIVE!

The solution is there, but it involves telling the American People the truth (true leadership is telling people what they DON’T WANT TO HEAR).  Until we do that we will be stuck in failure.