Trump’s ‘affordability’ bombast gained’t clear up his very actual financial issues
Is the affordability issue making President Trump schizophrenic?
“I don’t want to hear about the affordability!” Trump declared in a Fox News interview last month after falsely claiming the cost of a Thanksgiving dinner would be 25% cheaper than in 2024.
After Democratic candidates bludgeoned their Republican opponents with the issue in last month’s elections, Trump proclaimed on Truth Social Nov. 29: “I AM THE AFFORDABILITY PRESIDENT. TALK LOUDLY AND PROUDLY!”
At a White House Cabinet meeting Tuesday, Trump relapsed, revealing that the issue of affordability is a “hoax” and a “Democrat scam.”
Did Trump reach this conclusion by surveying members of his Mar-a-Lago club or what?
“Affordability” epitomizes how Trump is floundering on what had been one of his strongest issues.
A Gallup survey found that only 36% of Americans approve of Trump’s economic performance while a Fox News poll found that 76% of voters disapprove of Trump’s economy — an even worse rating than Joe Biden scored at the end of his presidency.
The White House acts as if more bluster can solve the problem. But is the Trump administration now targeting its economic message solely to people who failed high-school mathematics?
On Truth Social last month, Trump proclaimed, “DRUG PRICES ARE FALLING AT LEVELS NEVER SEEN BEFORE, 500%, 600%, 700%, and more.”
Actually, drug prices cannot fall more than 100% unless people are getting paid to swallow the durn free pills.
But it’s worse than that.
Prescription-drug prices have in fact increased roughly 2% this year, according to federal data. Trump did cajole price cuts for Ozempic and similar drugs — what the president Tuesday called “the fat drug, F-A-T, for fat people.”
\But that wasn’t sufficient to reduce drug prices overall.
Trump talks as if tariff revenue is magic beans that multiply every time he makes a wish.
He announced Tuesday at the White House that “in the not-too-distant future, you won’t even have income tax to pay because the money we’re taking in [from tariffs] is so enormous.”
But even with the sky-high tariffs Trump has imposed, federal income-tax revenue is seven times higher than tariff revenue.
Will Trump also give everyone a free pony?
Trump’s economic victory stunts are now akin to a bad magician whose tricks are so lame that his audience starts to heckle him.
At a White House event Wednesday, the “Freedom Means Affordable Cars” deregulation initiative was unveiled that could eventually trim $1,000 dollars off new-car prices. Trump promised it will “make buying a car much more affordable.”
But any future regulatory relief is dwarfed by the wallop from Trump’s tariffs.
Prices for new autos reached a record $50,080 in September — almost a 4% increase since last year.
Volkswagen raised prices up to 6.5% for new models. “Shoppers can expect the tariffs to increase car prices by as much as $6,000 on vehicles priced under $40,000,” Kelley Blue Book reported in September.
Some of Trump’s greatest victories do not yet exist beyond his imagination.
Trump proclaimed last month, “Our groceries are way down.”
No, grocery prices are up about 3% this year, and the costs of coffee, beef and other items have soared.
Is Trump adopting the Joe Biden proof of prosperity: “Don’t believe your lying eyes at the grocery checkout!”?
To entitle himself to continue blustering, the president wants citizens to abandon part of the American dream.
I was raised in the Appalachian Mountains, where people had fierce pride on owning their own abode.
You were “redneck rich” if your home was paid off — even if it was only a rough-hewn cabin and a few acres of land way up the hollow.
Young would-be homebuyers are hard squeezed nowadays.
Instead of Marie Antoinette’s “Let them eat cake,” Trump’s solution is “Let them be serfs.”
He’s championing 50-year mortgages, which mean most borrowers could never own their residence — or not take title until after they retire.
“It’s not even a big deal!” Trump said. “From 30, some people had a 40, and now they have a 50. . . . It’s not like a big factor!”
Will Trump adapt the World Economic Forum’s odious saying: “You will own nothing and be happy”?
Or maybe he’d recommend that average Americans solve their housing crunch by conniving to use eminent domain to seize prized urban lots at fire-sale prices — as Trump did in Atlantic City.
Perhaps Trump’s biggest handicap now is he’s no longer running against “Sleepy Joe Biden.”
Instead, Trump is going up against reality. He cannot obliterate economic statistics the same way he ridicules “low IQ” congresswomen and overfed reporters.
Trump may doom his presidency by sneering and seeking to make people feel unpatriotic for complaining his policies are slashing their family’s living standards.
James Bovard is the author of 11 books, including “Lost Rights: The Destruction of American Liberty.”