Bidenomics Collides with Reality

In America and around the world, marketing succumbs to events

He gives you his word as a Biden—no joke—it’s working!

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The Biden reelection campaign’s decision to embrace the pejorative Bidenomics seems destined to go down as one of the most embarrassing miscalculations in American history. I have no doubt that in 2024, the GOP candidate’s campaign commercials will make prodigal use of Joe Biden’s smarmy, whispered claim on behalf of Bidenomics: Guess what? It’s working.

Well, no, it’s not.

The fundamental problem for the US economy is inflation. Biden & Co. claim to have mastered that problem but in fact they haven’t done anything of the kind. Though inflation has moderated, prices have not followed suit. In fact, they’re still going up, though more slowly than before. And so are interest rates, as the Federal Reserve strives to bring inflation down to its target rate of 2%.

Inflation’s impact on the average American family can be summed up in a single word: pain. Today, that family finds itself spending around $800 more per month than it was spending two years ago. And thanks to rising interest rates, that family finds itself priced out of the mortgage and auto loan markets. The rate for a 30-year mortgage is edging close to 8%. If the President is wondering why his smile-button economic narrative isn’t breaking through, there’s his answer.

Of course, there are elements of the economic crisis looming over the country that are beyond the Biden Administration’s control. But that average American family isn’t interested in the excuses, however plausible, offered by Karine Jean-Pierre from the podium of the White House press room. They’re struggling to make ends meet and want to hear what, if anything, the President can do to help them right now. They certainly don’t want to hear that Bidenomics is working. They’ve already concluded that no, it isn’t.

It says something for the American people’s low opinion of Joe Biden that on economic issues they trust the Republican Party, dysfunctional though it may be, over the Democrats—and by a substantial margin. In reality, there’s not much basis for this preference besides fond memories of the pre-pandemic economy. Like the Democrats the Republicans have, despite their posturing over the budget, abandoned any semblance of fiscal responsibility.

Neither party is willing to address the primary driver of inflation: grossly excessive government spending. The GOP, for instance, makes a big deal out of aid to Ukraine, claiming that it’s breaking the bank—which is ridiculous. Aid to Ukraine is chump change in the context of a $6 trillion+ federal budget and a $1 trillion+ annual deficit. But harping on the Ukraine string enables opportunistic jerks like Representative Matt Gaetz to pose as budget hawks. And both parties flinch from entitlement reform like Count Dracula confronted with the consecrated Host.

In any case, recent international events have given Bidenomics its death blow. The Hamas invasion of southern Israel, and the bloody slaughter it perpetrated there, has touched off a war that may have parlous economic consequences for this country. Now there are major armed conflicts raging in two regions, Eastern Europe and the Middle East, both of involve vital interests of the United States, both with the potential to spread. But on both sides of America’s political divide, there’s a serious leadership deficit. The Republican House majority has reduced itself to a condition of dysfunction that would be comical if the situation were not so dire, while the presidency is in the hands of a man who is all too obviously incapable of doing the job.

Take, for example, one of the most urgent issues to be addressed by the federal government: The rehabilitation of the US armed forces and their expansion to a size necessary to address multiple threats around the world. In particular, the Navy needs attention: more ships of the right type, plus more resources to keep its existing ships operational. The deployment of two US aircraft carriers and their supporting warships to the eastern Mediterranean show how versatile a first-class navy can be. But even the mighty USS Gerald R. Ford can’t be in two places at once.

But a great deal of money will be required to bolster the US armed forces, which is to say that increased defense spending would worsen the fiscal crisis already plaguing the federal government. Thanks to the irresponsible behavior of both parties over many decades, the annual budget deficit and the national debt have become a drag on the economy and a brake on sensible policies across the board. There’s no sign that either party is interested in doing anything about the problem: Avoidance of reality and magical thinking rule the day.

No doubt the President’s people high-fived one another when they came up with the brilliant stratagem, as they conceived it, of embracing the pejorative, Bidenomics, and turning it inside out. What happened, alas, was that events turned their stratagem inside out. So now, Bidenomics is right up there with New Coke and Dylan Mulvany’s Bud Light spots in the annals of major marketing fails.