The Economy Wins

I grew up in a small town in a ‘red’ part of “deeply blue” California. I served in the military, but I’ve lived the majority of my adult life in the progressive bastions of San Francisco and New York City.

I didn’t vote for Donald Trump, but I understand his core message. It’s an economic message.

And it’s a message Democrats have paid a serious electoral price across the country for missing.

The core message is simple — the system isn’t working

1) Trade deals favor capital over labor.

2) Low skill immigration puts pressure on middle-income workers.

3) The Political system protected bankers over consumers in the financial crisis.

4) Both political parties are complicit.

America’s greatest strengths are creating access to economic opportunity and social mobility. But today, the economy doesn’t work for enough people, and the system doesn’t respond to the resulting anxiety. People on both sides are frustrated.

Proposal

Democrats have a proven track record as wealth creators.

I propose Democrats capitalize on their economic success and focus on addressing the country’s driving economic anxiety. This will resonate with people across the political spectrum and across the country.

Here’s the shift — Democrats hold complete political control of states with the greatest economic advantages, including New York and California. But Democrats confuse economic success with success in solving social issues.

For example, San Francisco has the strongest economy in the country and a $9.6 billion city budget… but also has broken public transit, largely unaffordable housing, struggling public schools, a disappearing middle class, massive income inequality, persistent urban violence, and thousands of homeless people living on the streets.

For some reason, no one seems to notice this. And somehow progressive Democrats want to export their social policies to the rest of the country while keeping their good-paying, modern-economy jobs local.

This is backward. San Francisco has a better track record of creating wealth than solving social issues.

What the country needs from successful economic regions, like San Francisco, is help to create prosperity in the parts of the country that have burdened the cost of the global economy. Places like Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Indiana.

As a country, we face many challenges — immoral levels of student debt, stagnating wages, rapidly changing job markets, institutionalized poverty, systematic economic inequality, and the persistent threat of terrorism — but the United States of America has everything it needs to solve these challenges.

We have the biggest economy powered by the most dynamic capital markets, the most innovative businesses, and the most skilled workers.

We enjoy an institutionalized rule of law, separation of powers, and the most effective, well-respected military on the planet.

But most importantly, we have a population of idealistic people — including a million annual immigrants — who believe in the American Dream and are willing to work to preserve it for future generations.

Today, the biggest threat to America is the growing cultural and political divide rooted in the disruption of our economic system. The system that produced the American Dream for me and that still defines the aspirations of many tens of millions of families today.

Donald Trump is president because the political system has not responded to the economic anxiety of the American people.

The Democratic Party must confront this challenge and lead all Americans in addressing this very real anxiety. People of all races, genders, and classes will continue to be impacted by the increasing pace of economic change.

The solution starts with realizing we’re all Americans, and we’re all in this together. None of us are going away. As President Obama beautifully said in his 2004 DNC Keynote speech, ‘There’s not a black America and white America and Latino America and Asian America; there’s the United States of America.”