What Causes Inflation?
The reason why everything is so expensive today is based on inflation. But what creates inflation? The simple answer is overspending. But how and by whom? Certainly, our government is the major reason why everything is so costly. However, don’t ignore the fact that the wild spending by business corporations also has a tremendous impact. When we spend more than we can afford, we have to borrow money and pay interest. Just like when businesses foolishly overspend, or our government overspends, the American people suffer the most when things collapse.
My books on the Donald Trump Presidency explain how, since the turn of the century, America’s debt has become exponentially greater, from billions to trillions of dollars. Leading up to the change into the 21st century, I experienced five decades of just moderate National Debt increases, which held my household expenses to manageable levels. Corporate profits were controlled, and business leadership reinvested in their company’s growth by rewarding workmanship with increased benefits. During this time period, I experienced my middle-class income grow. With the end of William Clinton’s time as President, things changed. He had budget surpluses for fiscal years 1998–2001, the only such years from 1970 to the present day.
Nation Dept in the 21th Century
In 1950, the National Debt was $257 billion. In 1981, it was $998 billion when President Ronald Reagan implemented his tax cut, greatly favoring wealthy individuals and corporations. This philosophy repeated during the Bush and Trump administrations – GOP capitalism. In 1982, Reagan increased spending and in 1983, the Jobless rate was 10.8%. In 1984, he increased defense spending, another rising expense that creates inflation. In 1987, the Stock Market crashed and President Ronald Reagan cited soaring federal deficits as having triggered the largest single-day Wall Street crash in U.S. history. In 1989, when Regan left office, the National Debt was $2.8 trillion. Realize that a trillion dollars is equal to a debt increase of $1,000 billion.
Then in 1991, when George H. W. Bush was President, we were faced with a recession. During his term in office from 1989 through 1993, the National Debt rose at a rate of about $400 billion annually. He was a one-term president when Bill Clinton won the presidency on January 20, 1993, and held office until 2001. During his eight years in office, the National Debt rose from $4.41 to $5.81 trillion, an average of only $175 billion per year. As one can see that even though President Clinton greatly decreased the rise in the National Debt by only $1.4 trillion over 8 years by balancing the Federal budget, the National debt still grew. From 2001 to 2022, when President Trump lost his reelection bid, the National Debt rose to $29.62 trillion. Being a fiscal conservative, these annual trillion-dollar increases that we have today make me fear for our future.
Also, during Bill Clinton’s presidency, his V.P. Al Gore, was instrumental in helping to create the “Information Superhighway,” Gore was one of the first government officials to recognize that the Internet’s impact could reach beyond academia to fuel educational, as well as economic growth. This is key to understanding how the internet affected corporate growth and why the cost of living has grown so exponentially. This is also detailed throughout both books.
Democratic vs Republican Control
This brings me to the comparison of how Democrats and Republicans control the functioning of our government. The difference between liberal and conservative philosophy (socialism vs capitalism) and how each of these concepts is misused and misunderstood. Our government must provide the best of both paradigms and the American people need to elect those political candidates that support both concepts. Our government needs to provide for the improvement of all social classes as well as for the improvement of our infrastructure.
When Republican candidate George W. Bush defeated incumbent V.P. Al Gore in the 2000 presidential election, it was by a slimness of margin. This was a controversial victory and a stain on our democratic election process. As my book explains, this has become increasingly more divisive with Donald Trump’s 2016 and Joe Biden’s 2020 presidential elections. The 2016 election demonstrated the profound effect that the expansion of the World Wide Web of internet communications technology has had on the minds and actions of the American people.
Not only have our technological advancements drastically changed our methods of communication, but it has also brought great wealth and power to those who are already affluent. They, in turn, have used this excessive flow of financial entitlement to support their successful achievements by setting up Political Action Committees: PACs and SuperPACs. At the same time, Rupert Murdoch, an Australian-born American billionaire businessman, through his company News Corp, worked to acquire hundreds of local, national, and international publishing outlets around the world. This is how the extremely wealthy can greatly influence election outcomes and control political candidates.
I vividly remember how Fox News would continually broadcast Socialism as a concept that is even more evil than Communism. The fear of spreading Communism over the concept of Democracy was the rationale that got us into the Vietnam War. This was a horrific decision by our U.S. Government leadership that swallowed up my future just like World War II did for my father. Fortunately, after WWII, America became a world leader in democratic freedoms and a nation at peace. A time when our government was willing to work on behalf of the American people, at least for the most part.
The 2001 Terrorist Attack on the United States
Then in 2001, our country was attacked by foreign extremists led by Osama bin Laden. Under newly elected Pres. Bush, using fear of further potential attacks on the United States, wealthy neo-conservatives heavily advocated for engaging in a war in both Afghanistan and Iraq. Consequently, our free enterprise system of government ramped up spending for military operations that included funding for civilian corporations and industries to help resolve problems that never really existed. We became involved in two world conflicts that lasted for over two decades, which ended in disaster for everyone.
During this period of increasing world disruption and hostility, both the Bush and Trump administrations deregulated business restrictions while Republican controlled legislators worked to undermine and defeat Obamacare, Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. The profiteering of corporations with the commercialization of the internet created the 2008 recession just when Barack Obama easily won the Presidential election. Subsequently, large corporations stopped their pension plans and increased health care costs for employees. Other businesses followed suit.
Fox News did its best to downplay the cause of the hardships that the recession created for middle-class working Americans. They broadcast blame on the cost of Government programs that help America with their financial struggles and disabilities. Conservative Media promoted tax plans that favored the wealthy and denounced programs for the poor and unfortunate. My books detail how this was allowed to happen.
