Let's chat a bit about how economically illiterate and incapable of leadership you have to be to propose a payroll tax deferral by Executive Order as Trump did yesterday. Thread:
1/ First, to state the blindingly obvious to all who aren't named Trump or sycophants to him, the economy and future employment prospects are not good.
2/ Job growth is slowed. We are at >10% unemployment. And we aren't going to turn the corner until we get the public health crisis under control. Other countries have shown us how to do that, but Trump is incapable of learning from their experience.
3/ That means that cutting payroll taxes benefits ever fewer Americans. Paying less employment tax doesn't matter if you're not employed. (The fact that this needs to be explained to public officials is baffling, but that's another conversation...)
4/ Meanwhile, you can't just pass laws from the White House. We have coequal branches. THIS IS NOT COMPLICATED FOR ANY HALFWAY EDUCATED PERSON TO UNDERSTAND. But it confuses Trump.
5/ All he's done is pass a payroll tax deferral that serves only to force employers to ask whether they should comply and then be responsible for re-collecting back taxes from employees after the deferral ends OR bet that the Congress will retroactively ratify that decision.
6/ Employers (unlike Trump) are not dumb. They see what's happening to the economy. They can appreciate the pressures the next Congress is going to be under with a Biden administration to put science first and get the economy back on track.
7/ But in the meantime, they know that aggregate employment numbers are bleak. Which not only means that we'll have to shift more resources to the unemployed, but also that they INDIVIDUALLY may have fewer employees next year.
8/ That latter point is key. Because if Trump's payroll tax holiday isn't made permanent, they would be required to re-collect back taxes due from FORMER employees, lest they be on the hook for that payment.
9/ I've run companies. Unlike Trump, I've had to be accountable to an independent board of directors. I cannot imagine taking a bet that the next Congress will ignore the unemployed, ratify Trump's silliness AND permanently destroy social security and Medicare.
10/ (Because that's what the payroll tax funds. Any vote to make it permanent is a vote to subject our seniors to poverty and no healthcare. Maybe Trump & his lackeys want that but I assure you the majority of the Congress does not.)
11/ But here's the thing. None of this is complicated. None of this is not known to folks in DC, in Congress or the WH. That's why everyone knows that the only way to give people the economic protection they need right now is with the joint support of the Exec & Leg branch.
12/ But to do that, you have to be willing to look out for all Americans. You have to understand how our government & laws work. You have to be accountable to more than just your own ego. You have to work collaboratively. None of that is in Trump's skill set.
13/ So instead of directing his team to get a deal done, he cosplays as President, signing executive orders that will either have no effect or destroy social security and medicare.
14/ He thinks this makes him look like he is a leader, like he's in command. But it simply exposes all his weakness. His inability to negotiate, to play nicely with others, to empathize or to understand what is going on in the economy and our country right now.
15/ In other words, it makes him feel personally like he is the President, even as he cowers from doing the work required to be Presidential.
16/ Meanwhile, 1000 Americans are dying every day. The economy is in free fall. The emperor is totally naked, but for his orange face paint. And the entire @GOP is falling over themselves to congratulate him on his tailor.
17/ Other countries have turned the corner. The difference isn't access to vaccines or therapies. It's simply having leaders with the intellectual integrity to play the hand they are dealt rather than lie about the cards they've already turned over.
18/ Facts are stubborn things. Sometimes they are politically inconvenient. Sometimes they are unpopular. But they are still facts. And anyone who claims to be a leader but shies away from facts in those moments ... is not a leader. Vote 'em out. /fin
