Being a Better Republican: My New Year's Resolution for 2024

Reframing Economics

There's no question that middle class tax cuts, which have long been a favorite Republican talking point even in unusual elections like a Governor of Vermont, are popular with most Americans. Even in the 2020 election, as Biden won my home state of Illinois by almost twenty points, Illinois voted against a proposed tax increase by six points. We even saw through the lie from Hell that the increase would only affect the rich. 

The problem is the other ways we talk about economics.

Nobody is going to vote for any politician who tells them that income inequality is a good thing, for instance, especially when many Americans haven't seen a real vacation in years while the top one percent who employ them hoard unimaginable wealth and buy hundred million dollar tickets to space.

Nobody is going to vote for any politician who tells them they can't take it easy after 65, after working a dead end job since they were 16 or even younger in some cases.

Nobody is going to vote for any politician who wants to end unemployment protections for people between jobs.

Nobody is going to vote for a politician who wants to end their insurance plan. Was Obamacare a bad thing? Yes, yes it was. But people genuinely rely on it to survive now. Pulling out the rug from under their feet is a surefire way to lose poor blue collar workers that we need to hold.

In short, nobody is going to vote Republican based on economics anymore.

So here's how you reframe the issues. 

First, agree that income inequality is a bad thing. 

Then, offer to fix it by lifting up the poor, not tearing down the rich. You can do this any number of ways. 

The more liberal answer would be to create something like the Tennessee Valley Authority, but nationwide. Hire those struggling to get by to fix our infrastructure for actually decent wages. You would be allowed to work for this program full time, part time, or even for a few hours a week to make extra money. Take this program and replace simple unemployment benefits with it, except for the elderly or disabled. If people are between jobs, give them one cleaning the streets. 

The more conservative answer would be to end student loan programs for college degrees with no real job prospects in the real world, like demifluid dance theory. College students would get loans to do cybersecurity, video game design, IT, real estate or insurance licenses, etc. Trade school, on the other hand, would get whatever student loan money was not going to college degrees that are actually worth something. Those students who opt for trade school will do a two to four year paid internship and graduate with money in their pockets instead of massive debt. Anyone who opts for the military (God bless them) will receive a $50,000 signing bonus. Even if it turns out they're not combat material, they will be put to work on everything from cooking food for soldiers and veterans to public works projects.

Second, promise to protect Social Security and Medicare at all costs. Don't raise benefits, but don't cut them either. Cuts would instead go to cutting incompetent government agencies and the salaries of overpaid bureaucrats instead.

As I said earlier, if people are between jobs, the government should offer them work in return for government benefits. If people are between jobs, give them one cleaning the streets. Benefits for sitting on your ever enlarging butt (which is now melding and becoming one with your chair) should only be for the retired and the profoundly disabled. Even for people with disabilities like myself who are mostly ambulatory and mentally "there", find something that they're good at and put them to work doing it.

As for Obamacare, it's here to stay. Do not expand it, do not repeal it, and do not replace it. Make it the new Social Security. There's no winning on that issue when everyone now depends on it. The time for that was in 2009, and we blew it. In 2023, Republicans shouldn't touch it with a fifty foot pole. If Biden puts the individual mandate back into effect, repeal the individual mandate and leave the rest of it alone.

Yes, we should cut taxes. We have that part right. But don't concede every other economic issue to the Democrats on the altar of a misguided view of "limited government." Sometimes the government does have a role to play. We just have to do it right.