By: George Noga – Substantially Updated April 8, 2014
Milton Friedman once asked a foreign government official why workers building a canal were using shovels instead of excavating equipment. The official proudly responded “to create more jobs of course”. Friedman’s classic retort was: “Then why not use spoons instead of shovels?” Most who hear this story viscerally comprehend the foolishness of the government official – except President Obama. He and his minions have said things every bit as wacky as saving jobs with shovels instead of bulldozers.
“Obama’s solipsism and narcissism shield him from his economic illiteracyand give him delusions of adequacy. He is not unlike a blissfully ignorant child incessantly toying with the economic dials that control the real world.”
Obama linked technology to job losses: “A lot of businesses have learned to become much more efficient with a lot fewer workers. . . . when you go to a bank and use an ATM machine you don’t go to a bank teller, or you go to the airport and you’re using a kiosk instead of checking in at the gate.” Even Economics 101 students recognize ATMs and kiosks as progress, as greater productivity, as the sine qua non of a higher standard of living and as an unalloyed blessing. Becoming more efficient and productive, doing more with less, produces the cornucopia of goods and services that makes America the envy of the planet. That our president misunderstands this reinforces the image of a child fiddling with the economic dials.
Obama, Biden and Pelosi have touted unemployment benefits as an economic panacea. They all have stated that unemployment benefits create jobs faster than any other initiative and they have the double benefit of putting money in the pockets of the jobless who then spend the money on consumption to create yet more jobs. Please Mr. President, can we have even higher unemployment so that we can create even more jobs? As far back as Adam Smith (1776) it was well understood that production, not consumption, is what makes us rich.
The USSR had enormous pent-up consumption but there were no goods to buy. John Stuart Mill debunked the consumption myth best: “the man who steals money from a shop, provided he expends it all again in the same shop, is a benefactor to the tradesman whom he robs, and that the same operation, repeated sufficiently often, would make the tradesman a fortune.” Obama has said that government created jobs will lead to stronger economic growth. He again has it bass-ackwards; economic growth must precede job creation. Obama is ignorant of fundamental economic truths known for at least 250 years. It is hard to dispell the image of a toddler in diapers playing at economics. A toddler is shielded by his age and lack of education; Obama is shielded by his solipsism, narcissism and an equally ignorant sycophant media.
Obama is harming the very people he passionately asserts he wants to protect, i.e. the downtrodden. He claims his spending binge is for social welfare and health care. Yet, he is condemning the current and future underclass to a much more hardscrabble life. America’s GDP growth already has slowed to European levels and over time the poorer among us will be infinitely worse off than they would have been with higher economic growth. Of course by then few will care or remember – no less understand, who was responsible.
“Obama’s failure to grasp the depth of his economic ignorance is wholly consistent with that of a solipsist and narcissistwho believes only the self exists and who is preoccupied with only his feelings and is egotistically self-absorbed.”
Obama Agonistes’ slavish ideological dogma and economic illiteracy are leading us all into a netherworld. The president’s people gleefully depict political adversaries throwing grandma over a cliff. Obama is throwing all of us (including his supporters) over the cliff – and all for a failed socialist chimera. Obama’s failure to grasp the depth of his economic ignorance is consistent with the behavior of a solipsist and a narcissist who believes only the self exists, who is preoccupied with only his feelings and who is egotistically self-absorbed.