My short quick take on Trump economic policy…
I think there is a good argument to be made that Trump’s bad economic policy ideas are worse than his personality and social conduct.
What few and vague actual economic policy ideas he has actually codified are economically ruinous which is why not a single one of the business leaders of Fortune 100 Companies is backing him. NOT A SINGLE ONE! (No CEOs at Fortune 100 Companies Are Backing Donald Trump)
And markets around the world are on edge (or hedging) worrying about a Trump Presidency driving a world wide recession or depression based on his threats to default on US debt if his revenue plans fall short (economists say they will, his GDP growth rates are pipe dreams) and to then try to renegotiate the debt destroying the good faith and credit the world has in the U.S. for decades if not a century. (What do financial markets think of the 2016
Justin Wolfers election? & Trump’s Comments on U.S. Debt Seen as Non-Starter by Bond Market – Bloomberg)
Promising the biggest tax cuts in history while dramatically increasing spending on immigration and the military will explode the debt and wipe out the reductions in the deficit we’ve achieved over that last eight years.
We already spend more on the military than next 8 nations combined and that spending is roughly equivalent to over half of all the income tax collected!
And beyond just the increase in spending to build a wall (Trump says $12 Billion and other analysts say its more like $25 Billion) it still needs to be financed by debt and it debt that will never be paid for. Saying Mexico will pay for it is a ridiculous pipe dream. In a country with a failing infrastructure building we don’t need to waste money on a project that is the definition of the word boondoggle.
And the cost of about $10,000 to deport each undocumented immigrant for a total of $400 and $600 Billion to apprehend, detain, process, and transport them all back to their countries you have the secondary economic costs of such an action is also just more debt to throw on the pile.
Deporting such a sizable segment of our agriculture farm and construction labor will boost food and housing costs for everyone. There would be empty shelves with food shortages everywhere (just like in Russia) and our food prices would go up 5-20%. Since 1-1-1/2% of the US’s GDP—comes from farms what will this do to Trumps GDP growth predictions? American farms are looking at production of 15%-31% less vegetables, 30%-61% less fruit, and 13%-27% less red meat. The price of what remains would skyrocket.
In the construction industry new construction and remodeling would grind to a virtual economic halt with the shortage of labor and a self-sabotaging shortage of concrete products and a spike in concrete prices thanks to a gargantuan “Wall” project we really don’t need.
Residential investment which includes construction of new single-family and multifamily structures, residential remodeling, production of manufactured homes, and brokers’ fees makes up roughly 3-5% of GDP and consumption spending on housing services which includes gross rents and utilities paid by renters, as well as owners’ imputed rents and utility payments account for roughly 12-13% of GDP. A stagnent housing industry would have catastrophic effects on the GDP.
Yeah Trump is a business expert alright, an expert at driving anything under his control into bankruptcy.