Free Stuff

In the 2012 election, Mitt Romney received a fair amount of coverage with his comments about the 47%. Basically, he said that 47% of the electorate would vote for Obama no matter what because they are dependent on government and need Democrats to provide for them.

Other Republicans have made similar comments, and many have characterized the Democrat debates as a contest to give away free stuff. (View from the Left)

Now, there's proof. Drawn to this because I'm curious about what drives people's politics, I was surprised to see that Romney's comments were justified. Maybe not 47%, but a solid segment of Democrats vote Democrat for the free stuff.

Excerpt from study (with my comments in bold)

I was caught off guard by how specific and personal Democratic voters’ issues tended to be. One woman told me she had lost a job because she had to take care of a sick relative and wanted paid family leave. Another woman told me her insurance stopped covering a certain medication that had grown too expensive and she liked how Clinton and Sanders talked about lowering drug prices. One man told me his wages were stagnant at his hotel job and he was looking for policies to increase them.

Though the first two would qualify as free stuff, "policies that increase [wages]" doesn't necessarily qualify unless the policy is a minimum wage or legislation raising the wage.

Another way to spin this, as opposed to Vox saying "Democrats want specific things and Republicans want philosophical," is to say that Democrats want policies that help them personally, Democrats are selfish with public policy, while Republicans want what's good for the country. I'm sure the Left is apoplectic reading that, and I'm not saying it's always true. I would argue, however, that the non-elitist portions of the Democrat party are motivated more by personal wishes than what's good for everyone.

(If you read the link above to the Daily Kos, they cite how rich Republicans support lower taxes and weird tax breaks, etc. that benefit them, which is probably true for some Republicans, but why do so many Republicans support lower marginal rates at every level when most of them are not paying the highest levels?)

Trump Effects Economic Knowledge in the Media

From Yahoo! Finance's website.

Of all the times I've read or heard stories about tariffs, the only thing I've ever heard was how they would help American workers: Our steel manufacturers need to be protected from Chinese dumping. Tires too.

I can never recall reading a mainstream news article that mentioned that tariffs harm consumers, though it is mentioned frequently on Economics blogs I read.

Now, once Donald Trump proposes tariffs, they're terrible for consumers!

Of course, I already believed that, but I guess I can thank Donald Trump for changing the media's minds on tariffs. See, presidential candidates are extremely instructive. Despite the media constantly criticizing him and his followers, without him, they would never have seen the detrimental effects of tariffs.

Thank you, Donald Trump.