Liberals blame inflation on greed, but businesses cite economic forces
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
Liberals blame inflation on greed, but businesses cite economic forces
11-13 minutes
Procter & Gamble is charging more for diapers, laundry detergent, razors and just about everything else it makes, joining scores of corporations in a display of market power that is shocking consumers who grew accustomed over the past decade to prices virtually flatlining.
To P&G executives, the price hikes are unavoidable at a time when costs for wages, freight and raw materials are rising by the largest amount in two decades. Failure to act, the company says, could lead to thinner profits, layoffs, investment cuts and, eventually, a lower stock price. Plus, after years of balking at higher prices, consumers now are swallowing them.
But to liberals, P&G and its corporate kin are not reacting to inflation so much as causing it. Companies that are raising prices for beer, chicken, toys, gasoline and medicine, the critics say, are just using inflation as an excuse to pad record profits and to reward Wall Street.
"P&G is a great example. It's a huge, huge company with an enormous amount of market share," said Rakeen Mabud, chief economist of Groundwork Collaborative, a nonprofit that is critical of corporate behavior. "And it throws its weight around in a number of different ways and uses that power to take advantage of the situation."
The debate comes as a new Gallup poll last week found 17 percent of Americans believe inflation is the nation's top problem, more than twice the share in January and the highest figure since 1985. As prices have chugged higher in recent months, liberals' insistence that corporations are culpable has intensified. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) chastised fast-food company Wendy's in March for lavishing millions of dollars on its chief executive and spending $100 million to repurchase shares of its stock, saying the strategy represented "corporate greed."
But "greed," by itself, is a poor explanation for rising prices, according to investors, executives and many economists. After all, CEOs presumably were just as thirsty for profits during the decade before the coronavirus pandemic when most were unable to raise prices without driving customers away and annual inflation averaged less than 2 percent.
In practice, "corporate greed" is really shorthand for a sweeping critique of contemporary American capitalism, reflecting objections to the degree of competition in the U.S. economy, the priority afforded shareholders and the riches lavished on CEOs, according to economists on both sides of the debate.
"Everyone is talking about inflation & giant corporations have figured out that's an opportunity to not only pass along their own costs, but also do some price gouging to pad their profits," Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) tweeted in late March. "We must enforce our antitrust laws & promote competition so consumers don't get ripped off."
Where corporate critics see unrestrained greed and exploitation of vulnerable consumers, however, business-friendly Democrats detect the unremarkable workings of supply and demand.
Thanks to nearly $6 trillion in government spending, consumers - taken as a whole - are flush with cash. Surging spending on products like laptops and furniture, coupled with snarled supply chains, is resulting in higher prices, they say.
"In a trivial sense, it's true that businesses set prices to maximize their profits. They also choose wages and the level of employment to maximize profits," said Jason Furman, President Barack Obama's top economic adviser, who called complaints about corporate greed "just political ranting."
Liberals' diagnosis of what ails the U.S. economy has implications for the Federal Reserve's response to the highest consumer price inflation in 40 years, antitrust enforcement, and public tax and spending choices.
Economists like Mabud worry that the Fed will hike rates too much, driving up joblessness and effectively making people poorer. Instead, policymakers should tackle features of the economic system that are rigged against the average American, such as powerful monopolies and inadequate labor rights, she said.
"We know corporate executives are engaging in predatory, exploitative behavior," she said.
In late March, Sanders introduced legislation that would impose a 95 percent "excess profits" tax on the earnings of the largest U.S. corporations. Taxing whatever companies earn above their average inflation-adjusted profits for the five years before the pandemic would garner $400 billion per year, he said.
President Biden warned oil companies against "profiteering" after the war in Ukraine drove gasoline prices past $4 per gallon, and the White House also has criticized shipping companies and brewers for wielding excessive market dominance.
In February, Warren castigated several corporations on Twitter for similar practices, including Tyson Foods and the Kroger supermarket chain, and criticized P&G for raising prices on several products and "touting more to come."
The Justice Department in February launched an initiative to go after companies seeking "illicit gain" from ongoing supply chain disruptions.
But the options for immediate government action are limited. In legal terms, "price gouging" is generally a violation of state laws that prohibit businesses from jacking up the price of essential goods during declared emergencies. Otherwise, there is no law against charging what the market will bear.
Companies targeted by liberal lawmakers have been reluctant to trade rhetorical punches. Tyson declined to comment, while Kroger did not respond to a request for comment. Wendy's defended its CEO's compensation as "competitive and within industry norms."
Corporations banked a nearrecord $2.7 trillion in after-tax profits during the fourth quarter of 2021, almost twice as much as in the same period in 2009. But the average operating profit margin for companies in the S&P 500 index - how much is earned from each additional dollar of revenue - peaked in the middle of last year and is now 12.7 percent, about unchanged from 2018, according to Yardeni Research.
Carlos Gutierrez, who ran Kellogg's Mexico business in the 1980s when annual inflation approached 100 percent, said refusing to raise prices or cut spending in response to rising input costs would cripple a company.
Growing profits mean funds for research, new product development, marketing and wages, he said. Shrinking profits mean less money for all of that - and greater pressure to reduce costs, including by laying off workers.
"You have to fight to protect margins," he said. "Investors want to see a certain amount of margin and growth in earnings, if they're going to invest."
P&G's decision last year to begin raising prices by mid- to high single-digit percentages came after a decade of holding them to an annual average of 1 percent, according to Barclays.
As supply chains were overwhelmed during the first year of the recovery, the company's annual costs ballooned by $2.8 billion. Raw materials and shipping were the chief culprits, coupled with unfavorable foreign exchange movements.
Chief financial officer Andre Schulten told investors in February that the price hikes were "tailored" to conditions governing product categories, geographic markets or even individual "SKUs," the bar codes that designate specific items. In its most recent fiscal year, the company, which traces its heritage to 1837, reported $14.7 billion in profits on more than $76 billion in revenue.
The company often marries price increases with innovation, aiming for what it bills as "irresistible superiority." The idea is to give consumers a reason beyond force of habit to buy what P&G is selling. Self-contained laundry detergent capsules known as Tide pods, which bundle convenience with a high price, are an example.
Likewise, in the Pantene line of hair-care products, P&G offers something called a "hydration bomb": a single-dose hair treatment designed to provide 48 hours of improved look and feel. The improved version of Dawn dish soap is a degreasing formula called "Powerwash," advertised as being five times faster than conventional liquids.
Price increases - at least initially - will not produce enough new revenue to offset all of P&G's higher costs, let alone swell profits, Schulten said. Operating margin in the final three months of 2021 was 24.66 percent, essentially unchanged from 24.57 percent during the same period in 2019.
"They're pricing to protect profits, not to increase profits," Lauren Lieberman, consumer products analyst for Barclays, said.
P&G's response to cost pressures was closely tracked by shareholders. David Bahnsen, an investment manager in Newport Beach, Calif., has almost $100 million of client money invested in the company's stock and calls it "one of the most well-run companies in American history."
The consumer products company has delivered 14 consecutive quarters of rising sales while seeing its overall market share expand. Yet P&G's shares over the past 10 years have lagged behind the broader stock market, gaining little more than half of the S&P 500 index's return. Inaction in the face of rising costs would have irked investors.
Bahnsen dismissed the idea that consumers are hurt by the company's shareholder focus. Customers stick with the consumer products giant out of "brand loyalty," he said. If P&G increases prices unreasonably, it risks driving its customers into the arms of brand-name competitors or less expensive private-label store brands.
"They can't raise prices if the consumer isn't willing to pay it," Bahnsen said. "P&G has competition. They are regulated by the market."
Not nearly enough, liberals say. Even as P&G raised prices, it increased CEO Jon R. Moeller's annual compensation to nearly $24 million and returned $19 billion to shareholders in dividends and stock repurchases in one year.
In early March, Mabud told the House Financial Services Committee that P&G had a "chokehold" on the diaper market. P&G and Kimberly-Clark, maker of Huggies, account for 70 percent of diaper sales, according to Groundwork.
To Mabud, consumers' purchases of costlier P&G products reflect desperation, not devotion.
"It produces a lot of goods that people depend on," she said. "If you need to put a diaper on your baby, you need to put a diaper on your baby."
But a limited number of players is not the same as a lack of competition, according to Jeffrey Meli, head of research for Barclays. Diapers, he said, represent "a cutthroat market that is still contested."
One reason is that P&G offers products at different price points. Its Luvs brand diapers, for example, are less expensive than Pampers and also often sell for less than private-label alternatives, according to Barclays.
Even so, inflation "may provide 'air cover' for companies to wield market power more like traditional monopolists, raising consumer prices and intensifying inflationary pressures," Meli wrote last year.
It's too soon to conclude that already is occurring, he wrote. Companies are still trying to catch up with the burst of higher costs that accompanied the end of the pandemic recession.
"The surge of inflation caught everybody flat-footed," he said in an interview. "Companies move slowly with regard to pricing."
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I found this to be fascinating article.
It reads like a press release by the Chamber of Commerce.
When does "supply and demand" take a step back for the greater good? We hear endlessly from the right that "people are suffering" because of higher costs. Yet corporations say they "need" record profits. Bullshit.
Exactly, I need my beer and steak in the same volume as before without reducing my FIOS, cell phone and streaming video requirements.
Any thinking individual knows cell phones will not be removed from the poor, nor should they , and if at steak, is BEER, any attempted removal would show you what a TRUE Disapproval could look like
“In a trivial sense, it’s true that businesses set prices to maximize their profits. They also choose wages and the level of employment to maximize profits,” said Jason Furman, President Barack Obama’s top economic adviser, who called complaints about corporate greed “just political ranting.”
That's all it is. Even Obama's top economic adviser will admit it.
Since both the oil companies and large consumer product companies like Proctor and Gamble admit they raise prices to "maximize" profit during what you all say is a horrible inflation period, I assume you will stop blaming Biden.
The voters are going to blame Biden, just like they would blame Trump, had he gotten reelected.
If companies like Proctor & Gamble didnt "need" record profits do you think inflation would be as bad as it is now?
I don't know what corporations need in the way of profits, and neither do you.
When CEO pay is 350 times higher than labor pay, it’s clear where the profits are being pocketed.
I sure wish all the folks who complain about corporations would simply open their own businesses and pay themselves and their workers the amounts they want every corporation to pay.
Be mighty interesting to see if they could make a buck.
Two of my 401 retirement funds have large investments in P & G, Vanguard Total Stock Market Index Fund and Vanguard 500 Index Fund. I always say, what's good for Drinker of the Wry is good for the country.
We sure picked the wrong professions.
I sure wish all the folks who complain about corporations would simply open their own businesses and pay themselves and their workers the amounts they want every corporation to pay.
This is your response to CEOs making 350 times more than laborers? Sounds like you are saying that they actually need or deserve to be paid as much as 350 of their workers together. Not 10 actual workers, not 50, not 150, not 300, but 350 actual workers. If they were paid only as much as 100 of their workers, then the corporation could afford another factory full of workers. But nope, you think they need to live like American oligarchs.
Right. Corporations just started trying to maximize profit. That never happened before Joe Biden was President.
Yes, obviously.
I clearly did not say it or even imply it. If you think I did, perhaps you should read what I did write again.
Maybe, maybe not. Maybe the corporation doesn't need to increase output by that much.
I find it insanely stupid when someone tell me what I think.
Especially when they don't have a fucking clue.
Lol. Then what the fuck are you struggling to say? You’ve managed to write something in plain English that is indecipherable.
This:
I sure wish all the folks who complain about corporations would simply open their own businesses and pay themselves and their workers the amounts they want every corporation to pay.
Be mighty interesting to see if they could make a buck.
Now, what part of this is too difficult to understand? Please be specific and I'll see if I can explain it to you.
You'd be better served just reading what I write and not trying to figure out how to twist it into something you can try to argue about.
Exactly, we need some progressive CEO's that want to minimize profits by increasing costs (workers compensation and less investment in automation in favor of hiring more workers) while decreasing per unit revenue from consumers.
What does anything you wrote have to do with what you quoted from me? [removed]
Here is what I quoted from you:
You seemingly are saying you don't understand what you read. I offered my post again and asked you to point out what specifically you didn't understand.
[removed]
Here is what you quoted from me.
When CEO pay is 350 times higher than labor pay, it’s clear where the profits are being pocketed.
What does anything you have directed at me have to do with that? You responded by insinuating that us “complainers” couldn’t understand why CEOs need to make 350 times more than their laborers. Stop weaseling out of your idiocy and explain why.
You clearly have misunderstood my post.
No one is weaseling out of anything, you just are trying to argue a point no one but YOU made. Argue yourself, it is your point.
You are clearly not following very closely.
I DID quote you in your post 2.1.11 in my post of 2.1.12.
Perhaps your time would be better spent reading before commenting.
You clearly have misunderstood my post.
Fine. You still haven’t clarified it. Stop dodging and answer.
Not gonna happen.
If a board of directors thinks someone is worth paying that much, and the majority shareholders agree, it isn't any of your business. Who are you to decide what someone should be paid? If you own shares in companies that have CEOs making what you claim, you are a hypocrite.
Stop trolling.
That’s not an explanation, it’s the flimsiest of excuses. [Deleted]
No one owes you any excuses or explanations for what they are paid. Like I said, open your own corporation and pay yourself as CEO and all of your workers whatever you think is fair.
I won't bitch about it for sure.
You sound a little bitter about sticking your foot in shit and leaving your shitty footprints all over this thread. It was a simple comment that wasn’t even directed at you, but you just had to sailor dive right into it without any way to answer to it.
The fuck it wasn't directed to me.
here, let me clue you in:
Post 2.1.23--TO ME AS ANYONE CAN CLEARLY SEE:
And you received an answer, whether you choose to recognize the fact or not.
I’m talking about 2.1.4 - you know, the actual point where you dove into this with 2.1.5? It’s nauseating that everything has to be explained to you. And 2.1.21 is not an explanation by any stretch of the imagination, it it simply excusing corporate greed. These are the types of responses that come from what are commonly known as useful idiots.
Thats the point. If you need everything explained to you , you will be inherently annoying, which is the goal.
Then you should have replied to THAT comment.
I don't need any explanations from you regarding anything, whatever gave you that clueless idea?
You have never, ever managed to successfully "explain" anything to me.
I don't see that changing in the future, either.
Sealioning at it's finest.
You achieve your goal magnificently.
JR, be honest here--why would I ever give a flying FUCK what you consider me?
That would indicate I value your opinion in some way.
Don't flatter yourself.
Bla bla bla .......Bla bla bla .......Bla bla bla .......Bla bla bla .......Bla bla bla .......Bla bla bla .......Bla bla bla .......Bla bla bla .......Bla bla bla .......Bla bla bla .......Bla bla bla .......Bla bla bla .......Bla bla bla .......Bla bla bla .......Bla bla bla .......Bla bla bla .......Bla bla bla .......Bla bla bla .......Bla bla bla .......Bla bla bla .......Bla bla bla .......Bla bla bla .......
No bla bla.
This isn't one of your infamous Trump articles--yet.
Shareholders.
People who save and invest.
What they need or deserve is not up to you.
Is the CEO giving them part of his oligarch salary?
What they need or deserve is not up to you.
You're welcome, Captain Oblivious.
And why should he?
Sick burn bruh.
So why again are you asking if a CEO is donating his pay?
Sigh … once again it has to be explained to you. You responded to, me when my comment was to Jack_TX (twice). If you would just read comments and mind your own fucking business when they aren’t addressed to you, you wouldn’t be so lost. Or is Jack_TX a sock puppet of yours?
Please take a few minutes and learn this is a public forum where any member can comment.
THAT is how this shit works.
Jack speaks for himself and doesn't appear to be anyone's puppet. Pretty asinine question no matter how you try to spin it.
I am curious as to what gives you the right to dictate what other people are worth.
You’re like a gnat.
I am curious as to what gives you the right to dictate what other people are worth.
I am curious as to what gives you the right to dictate what other people are worth.
How did you confuse a mosquito for a gnat?
hey, at least he took a swat at it...
An unsurprisingly asinine question.
You admit this is an obvious concept, yet you clearly think you are somehow able to judge who deserves what.
Me: When CEO pay is 350 times higher than labor pay, it’s clear where the profits are being pocketed.
You: Shareholders. People who save and invest.
Me: Is the CEO giving them part of his oligarch salary?
Since this is obviously confusing the two Texans, I guess I need to point out again that CEO pay being 350 times higher than labor pay is a huge drain of profits into one pocket. This obscene disparity in pay grade is unique to this country among world democracies.
yet you clearly think you are somehow able to judge who deserves what.
I am curious as to what gives you the right to dictate what other people are worth.
Will one of you two geniuses in Texas point out where I made that comment?
The real sheep are the ones who think it is "good" for America to have an economy that caters to the CEO's managers owners and stockholders preferentially over workers.
I heard something the other day. A few decades ago 70% of the fruits of the economy went to labor. Today it is about 50%. That 20% shift has gone into the pockets of CEO's , owners, managers and stockholders. There is no justification for this other than that the public accepts it.
I couldn’t find a good gnat, but the blood sucking disease vector is definitely more fitting.
Oh, the irony.
Only if you don't understand the difference between millions and billions. CEOs get paid in tens of millions. The companies paying them are earning tens of billions.
For example, Satya Nadella made $49.9 million in FY 2021. That's about $.0067 per share. Meanwhile, company profits were about $60 billion, or $8/share.
So if you owned 100 shares of Microsoft, you paid about $.67 toward the CEO's pay. Meanwhile, your shares went from $206.26 to $277.65 and paid you $2.19 worth of dividends. Each. So that 100 share block made you $7358 in profits.
So I'm not sure that $.67 actually constitutes a "huge drain" on $7358. But then I understand the difference between millions and billions.
I'm curious how you don't recognize your use of words like "oligarch" or "obscene" to be proof of the fact that you believe you are able to judge what other people deserve to be paid.
This country has an extreme disparity between CEO pay and laborer pay that does not occur in other countries. That’s not judging, it’s just fact. From the link I provided:
Growth of CEO compensation (1978–2020).Using the realized compensation measure, compensation of the top CEOs increased 1,322.2% from 1978 to 2020 (adjusting for inflation). Top CEO compensation grew roughly 60% faster than stock market growth during this period and far eclipsed the slow 18.0% growth in a typical worker’s annual compensation.
What laborer busting their ass all week long for barely enough money to put shoes on their kids’ feet wouldn’t find that obscene?
There is an obvious level of fiscal irresponsibility in these CEO pay packages. That level of irresponsibility at the top filters through every decision beneath. This is why your food products keep coming with smaller amounts in the same size package, and why chemicals banned in other countries are broadly used in manufacturing here, and any other decision that increases profit for shareholders at the expense of anyone who is not a part of the rigged game.
Yes. It also has extreme levels of opportunity that do not occur in other countries.
So you're retracting the use of the words "obscene" and "oligarch", as well as withdrawing the accusation surrounding "saying that they actually need or deserve to be paid as much as 350 of their workers together"?
So you're retracting the use of the words "obscene" and "oligarch", as well as withdrawing the accusation surrounding "saying that they actually need or deserve to be paid as much as 350 of their workers together"?
Not at all. Opportunity should not be considered as carte blanche justification for driving income inequality into the stratosphere.
Not if you understand the difference between millions and billions. Or billions and trillions.
You seem to use the terms "fiscal irresponsibility" and "focus on profit" interchangeably. As Inigo Montoya might say, I do not think they mean what you think they mean..."
The shareholders who are part of your so-called "rigged game" constitute more than half of American households.
The game is definitely rigged....in favor of people who save and invest and against people who do nothing more than whine about how the game is rigged. That's as it should be.
So we're back to you believing yourself able to judge who should earn what.
Your position is obvious. If a corporation can find a way to distribute all of its earnings to the upper management and shareholders while keeping the actual laborers at the lowest possible poverty level that still somehow keeps them alive, then everyone is getting paid what they deserve. What a noble person you are. I think we’re done here.
The game is definitely rigged....in favor of people who save and invest and against people who do nothing more than whine about how the game is rigged. That's as it should be.
Moronic. Apparently you missed the part where the laborers don’t have money to invest because they’re barely getting paid enough to keep themselves alive.
You keep on with the irony. It seems to grow in direct correlation with your lack of knowledge on a subject.
What a gargantuan crock of shit.
My wife and I were Oklahoma schoolteachers when we started. We managed to squeeze $25/mo out of a ridiculously tight newlywed budget. So the idea that "laborers don't have money to invest" is especially laughable.
My wife and I are currently working with a local church to help resettle an Afghan refugee family. The guy has a job in a Tex Mex restaurant, making $12/hr. His pregnant wife looks after their 3-year-old daughter and speaks zero English, so she doesn't work. HE is saving money every month.
Single income...refugee... taco bender.... with wife and kid, and he's saving $100/mo. Did I mention he's only been in the US for 90 days?
If a literal refugee can save $100/mo, so can people who were born here. They just don't.
BTW, $100 will buy you a share of ATT, Ford, Bank of America and Kinder Morgan. Every employee of all four of those companies will be going to work every day to make you money.
I'm sure you think so.
You pretend that the law of supply and demand does not apply to labor. It does. Employees who can make more money elsewhere can and do leave to sell their labor at a higher price.
Everybody seeks value. That's true of consumers, it's true of businesses, and it's true of employers. If you can get the same product for less at a different store, most people will do that. If a business was paying their accounting firm 30% more than they could acquire the same services elsewhere, you would rightfully think them foolish.
In the same way, an employer who overpays for labor is making a bad decision.
One of the million things you want to overlook on your little crusade here is the fact that individual laborers have power. The higher the skill level, the more power they have.
Your comments are bizarre, thats really the only word for them, although social darwinism also comes to mind.
You seem to have the belief that paying shareholders should be the main purpose of any corporation , and stockholders should take preference over the people who make the products or services which allow the company to make money.
Your point of view is obviously shared by many, but its completely arbitrary. There is no big book in the sky that demands that stockholders take preference, it is simply what businesses decide to do. Many executives have compensation packages that make them more money the higher the companies stock price is. So that is their motivation.
Lack of organized labor is the problem here. Workers have little power and so are subject to exploitation.
You find truthful comments "bizarre". Which I guess doesn't surprise.
It's not a belief. It's fact. Businesses exist to make money. That's why they are started and their continued existence depends upon it.
You act like the business exists for some other reason than to be profitable.
1934 called and wants its ideology back. Do you read the actual news or just the looney lefty pages? Do you realize how much power individual employees have right now? Do you realize how many businesses are closing because they can't find people to work?
Any employee who doesn't like their current job for whatever reason can have a new one in a few days. They are in control of their own situation. That's power.
Power is NOT handing your livelihood over to some corrupt union boss.
Your comments are still bizarre.
Would there even be a business without employees? The idea that employees are required by some unwritten "law" of business to take a back seat to investors is utterly arbitrary. Do you understand that?
You have said here that everyone can buy stocks and if they dont do that it is their own fault and they dont deserve a fair shake from business owners.
Lets say two "employees" have a 1000 dollars apiece. One of them buys stock and the other buys tickets to take his family to a half dozen major league baseball games during the summer.
By your lights, the second person has lost all ability to "complain" about wages because he didnt buy stock and instead wasted the money by using it to make his family happy.
You have to be kidding.
Certainly. There are literally hundreds of thousands of American businesses with no employees.
Businesses do not exist to provide employment. Do you understand that?
Businesses hire employees if and only if those employees help that business become more profitable.
They may not exist to provide employment yet they cannot operate without it....
Yes.
Somewhat.
No. And I bet a dollar against a donut that you cannot begin to define "fair shake" in any quantifiable sense.
No.
The utterly obvious point is that neither should complain about wages. If they are unhappy with their wages, they DO something. They should find a job with better wages. If they cannot find such a job, they should start their own business and see how much they can actually earn.
If nobody is willing to pay them more, and they can't manage to make more on their own, they need to consider that they're making what they're worth.
Regarding your two examples, everybody should be saving and investing first and then spending money left over on luxuries like MLB.
I'm done with this. We have all made our points.
Lots of them actually do, but that's beside the point.
For businesses that require employees, yes, they cannot operate without them. Those employees provide a service, and the employer buys that service just like it buys any other. Businesses try to get the most value for their money, the same way households do.
If you have the choice between two very similar phone service providers (for example), but one of them costs 20% less, you'll probably buy that service instead of the more expensive one. If one bank charges you lower fees than another, you're likely to choose that service.
In the same way, businesses try to get the best value for their money when buying labor. In markets like we have now, workers can command much higher prices for that service. In recessionary labor markets like we'll enter into soon, supply outpaces demand and they have to accept lower prices.
It's very simple economics, which John doesn't like because it sinks the traditional labor union rhetoric like the iceberg sank the Titanic.
And that’s just a chicken or the egg scenario.
Its a fools errand trying to describe the nuances of business to people who have not toiled to make and run a successful one.
If Manchin had only allowed BBB to pass, that huge infusion of debt fueled stimulus would have taken the bite out of this inflation.
Democrats love to bash corporations in public; and then take millions in campaign contributions from them in private.
Why won't Democrats refuse to take any campaign donations from these evil corporations; and prove to the voters they are as good as their condemnations?
Hypocrites, of course.
Well, the data should show if profits are driving inflation. If corporate profit margins (profit as a percentage of total revenue) are increasing then profiteering is contributing to inflation. The government has the data so there isn't any need for political hand waving; the facts would speak for themselves.
They have the data. They are just scared shitless to reveal it, or better still use it.
If corporations are driving inflation; then the Democrats would be forced to honor their word and go after them. Losing huge campaign contributions in the process.
If corporations aren't to blame; then everything falls back on Brandon and the Democrats. Midterms turn into even a larger blood bath than they are already going to be.
I'm going to venture a guess that the data they have does not make them look good. That would explain whey they have used excuse after excuse to justify it. It went from being "transitory" to being "Putin's fault" over the course of the past year.
I'm going to let you remind us all of the last time any data made any of them look good....because I certainly don't remember.
Yeah, I don't remember either. But I'm sure there are some here who will make up something...oh wait there the fiction is 5.1.3
Undoubtedly.
Well to be honest it's not entirely fiction. But Paul Harvey would turn over in his grave if we didn't tell the rest of the story.
A lot of what made the entries in 5.1.3 truthful was the ending of the Covid lockdowns which allowed all those people to go back to work. Also the ending of the extra money for the unemployed. The number of American's vaccinated would not have been possible without the creation of the vaccines during the previous administration and the streamlining of the approval process by the previous administration.
But like all politicians they are allowed to spin their accomplishments when they talk about them. Show me a politician who doesn't spin when self-promoting and I'll show you a politician who's already dead and in the grave. The Biden administration has done some good things. But the bad outweighs the good and this just won't be enough to help the Democrats in November's elections.
It's a meme with nothing to back it up...it's fiction.