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Another thread on Howard Schultz’s presidential aspirations, this time focused on his policies. What Howard calls “centrism” is just trickle-down economics—tax cuts for the rich, de-regulation for the powerful, and wage suppression for everyone else—but without the overt racism.
He’s clothing it in the bogus Neoliberal “responsibility” frame by stoking fears about the deficit and arguing, as trickle-downers always do, that anytime we tax the rich or big Corp's, it will kill jobs, kill growth and, you know, harm the very people we intend to help.
Howard argues that the only honest, reasonable path is to balance the budget by cutting the programs that sustain the middle class, cutting taxes for the rich to increase growth, and keeping wages low (no $15) to “help business.” All of this is an empirically demonstrable lie.
First, the cause of the deficit, as Summers and Furman have shown, isn’t that we spend too much on the middle class, but that we cut taxes too much on people like myself and Howard Schultz.
Second, economists Furman and Summers have demonstrated that while we should not try to increase the deficit, it poses no real threat to the economy whatsoever. foreignaffairs.com/articles/2019-…
The big argument Schultz and other billionaires make—that higher taxes harm growth and are un-American—is unmitigated bullshit. There is zero correlation between high tax rates and any dimension of growth as you can see here. (Read this for more info: prospect.org/article/want-e…)
And let me remind you that the periods in American history that enjoyed the highest rates of sustained economic growth and had the most robust middle class with the lowest amount of political polarization were the periods when tax rates on rich people were 70-90%.
This is not a coincidence. Economic policy focused directly on building the middle class increases growth for everyone AND makes the country less polarized. Why? Because when everyone is winning, not just rich guys like Howard and me, voters are less angry and we get more growth.
Schultz claims that by beginning to focus policy on materially helping middle class people- Medicare for all, affordable college, $15 min wage, etc, the Democratic Party is “lying to Americans”. This is horseshit.
The truth is, Schultz wants Democrats to continue to tell the lie that billionaires want to hear: the only thing that matters in the American economy is billionaires. And if Democrats aren’t willing to spread the lie anymore, Howard will do it himself.
Not all rich people are completely self-serving. But when someone super wealthy tells you that what benefits the rich is good for the economy, and what benefits you is bad for the economy, know this: They are fucking lying!
