The Economy Really CAN Be That Simple. If Biden Just EXPLAINS It That Way

The other day my daughter and I were reminiscing about her growing up. It might or might not surprise you that with my ex, U was the one who did most of the nurturing, And as a comic, I quickly found that my skills to mimic were pretty good. And it turns out that one of my daughter’s favorite things was getting her bedtime story. Mainly because they laid there in bed, getting a Sesame Street gook read to them, every word in a passable interpretation of the voice of the original character. Kind of like a radio play of the 1930’s.

I mentioned the whole bedtime story thing for a reason. Because most adults in this world, or at least in this country have an inner child, especially where adult things are concerned. Just look at the news these days. Damn! There’s some serious, scary sh*t in there! You have to read big words, some of which you might not even know, and then try to make it all make sense. Wouldn’t it be nicr to hear the latest economic news, in language you could actually understand from Big Birf or Kermit the Frog? Just ask yourself, what is a movie really, except a bedtime story for people who are too lazy to pick up a freakin’ book?!

And wondrously enough, that’s exactly what happened today on MSNBC. Chris Hayes had am award winning economics professor on to discuss today’s latest monthly economic data. The professor kind of surprised Chris right off the bat when he related that one of the problems with economics is that people watch the results every month, comparing them like baseball box scores. And that’s the wrong approach, because economics is a long term game, like reading the chess moves from a couple of grand masters in real time. And then he laid a little magic on us;

Let’s just say that it’s exactly three years ago, and that you’re a princess. You decide to take a nap, but being a serious princess, you look at the new government economic numbers, then take your nap. Something goes wrong. In fact it isn’t until today that a prince kisses you, and you wake up. But still being a serious princess, before doing anything else, you look at the newest federal economic numbers.

And say, What the Hey?! There are some 2.4 million new jobs since you ell asleep, unemployment is lower by  almost two points, inflation is flat, and people are making more money. You think to yourself, Wow! Something really great must have happened to the economy while I was sleeping.

Not exactly. What happened was a global pandemic causing a protracted global near economic shutdown. This caused near record unemployment, near record inflation, the worst recession since the Great Depression, and what should have been the second housing market crash in 15 years. What you’re looking at is an economic miracle, only you don’t realize it because you were sleeping every day looking at the damn numbers.

And he’s right. Every damn word. When I look at it the way he explained it, I couldn’t help but remember the crash of United flight 242 at Sioux City, Iowa. I was scheduling pilots for United back then. In mid flight there was a catastrophic explosion in the tail engine of the DC-10. The shrapnel from the engine fan blades unbelievably managed to sever all three redundant hydraulic systems, something thought impossible. They had to fly manually. Fortunately an off duty 2nd officer deadheading home ran up to the cockpit, and manually manipulated the two remaining engine throttles to keep the flight stable. With no hydraulics they ran a perfect approach to the airport, manually cranking down the landing gear. But at the height of 8 feet, a sudden puff of 10 mph  cross wind tipped the starboard wing. The port wing dug into the soft grass, and the plane cartwheeled down the runway, miraculously only killing dozens instead of decimating the entire airplane.

An economic United flight 242 is what President Biden and his economic team walked into. But thanks to steady leadership by President Biden, sage advice from his economic team, and brilliant flying by Captain Jerome Powell of the federal Reserve Board, there is no 10 mph crosswind in sight, and they’re about to land the economy like somebody putting a wine glass down on a bar.

But United flight 242 was still a tragedy, because we all watched it in real time, and people died. That’s all people remember. Most people either don’t know or remember the brilliant teamwork and airmanship from the crew that kept flight 242 from plummeting nose down from 25,000 feet and killing all on board. And because everybody lived through the pandemic and aftermath, nobody realizes the brilliant response of the Biden economic team to spare us from 15% unemployment, 12% inflation, a housing market collapse, and flattening wages. Because none of it happened.

And that’s exactly how Biden and his surrogates should be handling this. Maybe they can hire that professor to go on the road with them. Because he has precisely the correct educational angle. K.I.S.S. Like most humans, I have little attention span left over for anything more complex than Candy Crush.

And it really is that simple, when explained in common English. And make simple easy to understand comparisons with the monstrosity left by Traitor Tot. Hell, even an untutored goof like me can manage to get the point across, even without the amusing Muppet voices.

Look folks, if you woke up today from that three year nap, you’d immediately notice that we have 2.4 million more jobs created today than we had two years ago. But what you’re not seeing in the 23 million jobs that we lost during the pandemic. So we not only made up everything that we lost, we added another 2.4 million jobs to boot.

Right now unemployment is at a near record low. What you’re not seeing is that as a result of Covid, we had 12% unemployment two years ago. But we moved decisively to get financial help to the lower and middle class Americans that needed the help the most, and subsidized small and medium businesses to keep employees on the payroll until they could reopen again. And as a result, we now have one Americas available to fill every three open jobs.

Which is critical because having more open jobs than demand for jobs means that unemployed Americans to negotiate better wages and conditions in order to sign on to work there. And as a result, for the first time in almost a decade, American wages are finally rising faster than inflation. The lowest 40% of American households now have more money coming in every month than going out. And that will only continue to improve as inflation continues to come down as the effects of the chicken virus and the supply chain issues finally come to an end.

I could go on, but why bother? You get the picture. Most people, myself included, tend to think of the issue of economics in a fluent, day-to-day manner. That’s because most of us live in a day-to-day world. What we have in our wallet, in our checking and debit account, the balance of our credit cards, that is how we live our daily lives. But the things that control what we’re looking at on a daily basis take weeks, if not months to make their presence felt in our wallets. And knowing how those things are going at a 30,000 foot level can help to calm us. HA-HA-HA! The Count says that you have $1,375 more in your saving account and $620 more in your checking account than you did three years ago! Ha-Ha-Ha! Spend it wisely. Come on. Feed your inner child. You know you want to.

I think you for the privilege of your time.