‘Bidenomics’ is the death blow to the American dream
The fact that the media, the White House, and the rest of the Democrat establishment continue to parrot the “Bidenomics is working” talking point is one of the many reasons why they’re not trusted. The public is continually told that the economy is strong because consumers are in good shape; see this summertime message from the White House:
President Biden and Vice President Harris came into office determined to rebuild our economy from the middle out and the bottom up, not the top down—and that strategy is working.
On CNBC yesterday, a Biden economic advisor said the economy is “exceptionally” good—I wonder what she has been smoking.
In September, Business Insider reported that “Biden’s economic policies have quietly made peoples’ lives better” but the problem seems to be that the public just isn’t smart enough to realize it.
And from the Hewlett Foundation:
Over the past two years, we have not been watching the economy slowly deteriorate as a consequence of the federal government’s reckless overspending. We have instead been witness to a remarkably swift recovery from the worst economic crisis in 90 years, amid a profound turnover in the global economic order.
Somehow, they “can’t recall” that the economy and jobs were growing rapidly during the last six months of 2020, and inflation was low. Instead of stating facts, they repeat Democrat talking points. I would challenge anyone to look at the following facts about the economy and brag about what great shape the economy is in:
Home affordability is at a record low:
Home prices finished the summer at another record high as home affordability tanks to a historical low.
Over 50% of Americans live paycheck-to-paycheck, especially those making less than $100,000:
Statistics vary, but between 55 percent to 63 percent of Americans are likely living paycheck to paycheck. Three in four Americans who earn less than $50,000 are living paycheck to paycheck compared to roughly two in three of those making $50,000 to $100,000.
Where is the evidence that Biden is building the economy from the bottom up and middle out?
How can anyone claim, with a straight face, that consumers are in a strong position when over 60% of the workforce can’t come up with $500 for an emergency?
People can’t afford to pay their bills, so they are running up credit card debt, which comes with consistently rising interest rates:
U.S. credit card debt increased by $45 billion from Q1 2023 to Q2 2023 leading to a new all-time high. Nearly 50% of cardholders carry debt from month to month, up from 39% in 2021.
Autos cost more than ever, significantly due to government mandates and regulations forcing the industry to focus on electric cars, and as a result payments are skyrocketing:
The rising interest rates in the U.S. have led to record-high loan payments for consumers who borrowed money to buy new cars, per the report. The average monthly payment of $736 is the highest on record, with nearly 18% of car buyers paying at least $1,000 per month.
This obviously hurts the poor and middle class more than the rich. How is that building the economy from the bottom up?
As people run up debt, they can’t keep up with their payments:
Credit card and car loan delinquencies pass pre-Covid levels as consumers get squeezed
More Americans are failing to make payments on their credit cards and auto loans, another sign of rising financial pressure on consumers.
New credit card and auto loan delinquencies have now surpassed pre-Covid levels, according to a Wednesday report issued by Moody’s Investors Service.
Poverty levels hit all time record lows in 2019 after three years of Trump’s lower taxes, fewer regulations, and energy independence policies. Now, poverty rates are rising. Does that indicate that the economy is growing from the bottom up? From Brookings a few weeks ago:
According to the latest ACS data, nearly 41 million people in the United States lived below the poverty line in 2022. That is nearly 1.5 million more people than in 2019, before the pandemic struck.
The percentage of Americans claiming “hardship” to raid their retirement funds has more than tripled since 2019:
More Americans are raiding retirement funds for emergencies
More people are making hardship withdrawals from their 401(k) accounts, raiding retirement funds to cover emergency medical expenses or to avoid losing a home.
Hardship withdrawals from Fidelity Investments 401(k) accounts have tripled in five years, according to a report from the investment firm. The share of plan participants withdrawing money rose from 2.1% in 2018 to 6.9% in 2023.
Real wages rose rapidly during Trump’s years and have fallen most of Biden’s three years. That certainly does not help those at the bottom, no matter how often he repeats it. From CNN via Yahoo News:
American inequality is rising despite higher wages
Which of the above economic facts provides a reason for the media, Biden, and other Democrats to be proud?
Anyone who looks at the above results after three years of Bidenomics and decides they want five more years of this compounding disaster should have their heads examined.
Image: Free image, Pixabay license, no attribution required.
Bidenomics is a disaster for current and future retirees
A retiree’s income sources can include Social Security benefits, pension payments, annuity payments, tax-deferred IRAs or 401Ks, brokerage accounts and Roth IRAs. All have different rules on contributions and tax implications for withdrawals. There are two groups of retirees, those now retired and those who will retire in the future. All retirees will have difficulty managing life challenges with Bidenomics. For example, factors like inflation, Medicare, interest rates, taxes, and the potential for recession. These and other factors will impact those in retirement and those planning retirement. The overriding concern for both groups is that you cannot plan work history and retirement a second time. Today’s retirees are faced with fixed incomes and inflation close to 20%. Investments are slowly eroding away, even reserves. Future retirees are younger and still working. Some may have time to recover; current retirees will never have that option.
Current retirees include 18% of the U.S. population, individuals of all ethnicities many who defended the country. They were from the Silent and Boomer generations. Some are children of the Greatest Generation who experienced WWII and parents from the Great Depression. They were told to save for retirement, don’t depend on Social Security -- it may not be there, contribute to a company’s 401K or put money away because the economy will grow. Women from these generations had greater challenges because of lower wages, lack of available retirement plans, and the breakdown of the family.
Future retirees will come from Gen X, with today’s population of 65 million. Transamerica Center for Retirement Studies (TCRS) published a revealing study. Large pluralities of future retirees are pessimistic about wage growth and financial security. They found 41% of those surveyed felt that future generations of retirees will be worse off than current retirees. A report by Blackrock Investments shows that in 2023, only 53% of workers believe they are on track to retire with the lifestyle they want. This will cause an increasing trend to plan for retiring later. Growing focus will be necessary with reliance on Social Security benefits, Medicare, health and wellness, and retirement planning. Real worries and lack of confidence will have to be dealt with from a lack of retirement income caused by market volatility and high inflation.
America’s current and future retirees are frightened. The Consumer Price Index shows that prices have risen 19.4% since Joe Biden took office. That means 33 months of consumers watching their retirement funds disappear. Biden describes "Bidenomics” propaganda as growing the economy from the middle out and the bottom up, not the top down. It's stated as an economic vision where government educates and empowers American workers, which promotes competition to lower costs and help small businesses.
The economy has been defined by sky-high inflation and a robust labor market. While price increases may be slowing, costs remain elevated for staples like groceries, home necessities, and gas. The Federal Reserve’s attempt to tame inflation has impacted interest rates to 8%, the highest mortgage rates in 24 years making home ownership unattainable. A recent poll by the Associated Press found that two-thirds of Americans disapprove of how Biden has handled the economy. According to a CNN poll over three-quarters feel the economy is in poor shape. Democrat economist Larry Summers made waves with highly critical remarks about Bidenomics and administration policies. One senior voter calls it a “jumbled mess”
Current retirees are the forgotten generation because of their age and life challenges, which are not clearly understood. Sadly, inflation has very much eaten away at their savings. Future Gen X retirees will represent the largest group of retirees in the history of the country. These soon-to-be retirees face unprecedented challenges in securing protected income that will last. News commentators, news editors, social media, congressmen and women, have never experienced retirement. They lack empathy, especially with all the critical life decisions that will have to be made. Unfortunately, we have a President who is more interested in selling the Bidenomics fantasy versus achieving reality.
Image: PxHere
The Deadly Folly of Our Open Border
Borders are “real or artificial lines that separate geographic areas,” according to National Geographic. They describe the purpose of borders - “to keep out invaders,” to “keep citizens in,” or to “protect resources.”
How is the U.S. border doing on these accounts?
Who is coming into America? Are we being invaded? What about American resources? I don’t mean minerals or timber, but taxpayer-funded resources such as food, shelter, clothing, education, and health care.
Our border is not keeping anyone in, especially virtue-signaling celebrities promising to leave America if a Republican is elected. Cher promises to leave America if Donald Trump is reelected in 2024. She also planned to leave America if George W. Bush was elected in 2000, and two decades later she is still here. The beat goes on, as she sang with Sonny.
Since President Biden took office in early 2021, the Customs and Border Protection Agency (CBP) has “encountered” almost 8 million border crossers, the majority young military aged males. In August alone, that number was 232,972, an annualized rate of 3 million migrants a year.
“Encounters” are only part of the story. How many snuck through without being encountered? Those are called “gotaways”. CBP reports 1,000 “known gotaways” per day.
As Fox News notes, “That means more than 1,000 individuals were seen or detected by Border Patrol agents but not apprehended per day this month. “
1,000 per day? That’s 365,000 per year, more than half the population of Wyoming. If you use the figure of 8 million known migrants during the Biden presidency, that’s more than the population of all but the 12 most populous U.S. states.
Image: YouTube screen grab
How many were undetected? That number is unknowable but the Center for Immigration Studies estimates somewhere between 50 and 68 percent of illegal border crossers are caught. How can they be sure?
How reliable is that number? How can they know what they can’t even measure? What if far fewer are caught? You don’t know what you don’t know.
The House Judiciary Committee also reports:
1.7 million known ‘gotaways’ have evaded Border Patrol and escaped into the interior since January 20, 2021, with untold numbers of unknown ‘gotaways avoiding detection during that period.
America’s open border czar, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, during recent Congressional testimony, reluctantly offered this gem:
600,000 migrants evaded apprehension this year alone as they illegally crossed the border into the U.S.
Additionally, Mayorkas did not have information readily available on whether the 169 terror watch list members who illegally crossed the southern border were in jail or deported.
Again, these are the border crossers they “know” about. How many crossed in the dead of night, encountered no one, and were undetected? 10 percent more? 100 percent more? 1,000 percent more?
And who are among these “gotaways”? Is it easy to cross the border undetected and get away? Who is more likely to evade detection, a mother with two young children, or a 25-year-old man with some military-type training, or, in other words, a potential terrorist or criminal?
I’m not sure what’s taught in Hamas or Hezbollah training camps, but if these warriors are being sent to illegally cross into the U.S. across the southern border, you can be sure detection avoidance is in their training curriculum.
As reported by Gateway Pundit,
Federal officials have seen an alarming increase in border crossers listed on the U.S. Terror Screening Dataset, the official name for what is commonly called the “terrorist watchlist.”
In fiscal 2023, which ends this month, Border Patrol agents have apprehended 172 such people, all but three of them along the southwest border. When all U.S. places of entry are added – by land, sea and air – another 564 people on the watchlist were caught, bringing the total to 736.
So, it’s not simply poor young families “risking everything for a better life” as Time claims. Or MS-13 members, a.k.a., “God’s children” as Nancy Pelosi sympathized. Or an “opportunity” as Pelosi also once acknowledged. Opportunity for what? Terrorism? Democrat votes?
What’s the danger to America with our open border?
After Hamas attacked Israel, the FBI issued this statement on October 9, “The FBI does not have specific and credible intelligence indicating a threat to the United States stemming from the Hamas attacks in Israel.”
How things have changed in just a few weeks. Or did things not change but we are finally getting a peek behind FBI obfuscation?
In Congressional testimony last week, FBI Director Christopher Wray claimed, “The FBI is not tracking “currently operating” terror cells or foreign terror cells in the United States” as summarized by The Last Refuge. Why not? Are they too busy tracking Catholics or school board parents?
Then comes the money quote from Wray, “The gaps in our intelligence are real, and that’s something we have concerns about.” Ya think? I hope they are doing far more than just having concerns.
Director Wray said, “We haven’t seen evidence that it’s actually happening yet” speaking of foreign terrorist directed attacks in the U.S. That’s comforting. Once the attack happens, “seeing evidence” is too late as it will be obvious to the world and of no benefit to the victims.
The Last Refuge outlines how many mass shooters and terrorists that the FBI had been fully aware of and watching, doing nothing preemptively but waiting until Americans were killed before acting on their knowledge.
These include the Boston Marathon bombers, the San Bernadino terrorists, the Colorado grocery store shooter, the Pulse Nightclub killer, and so on.
Instead, the FBI is wasting time organizing and inspiring the Gretchen Whitmer kidnapping plot and the January 6 “insurrection.” They send agents to investigate garage door pull handles that resemble a noose, harass parents attending school board meetings, and spy on and raid their political opponents and his associates while giving the current president and his family a pass on bribery and foreign influence peddling.
The Department of Homeland Security is no better. Secretary Mayorkas insists “The border is secure.” At the same time, his special agents are “making sandwiches” for illegal migrants. It’s a clown show.
Another caravan, 7,000 strong and growing, is heading to the U.S. while the Biden administration claims no less than 17 times that the border is secure.
End Wokeness tweeted how the Biden administration is organizing this invasion. Talk about a real insurrection.
This is Irineo Mujica
He is the man leading a massive caravan of illegal migrants to the U.S.
He admits that this crisis is a coordinated attack on the United States and Biden is allowing it
Chinese influencers are instructing migrants how to cross the U.S. southern border.
How many in the caravan are Hamas or Hezbollah terrorists? And President Biden seems just fine with it all.
Day late and dollar short FBI Director Wray acknowledges,
“In just the past few weeks, multiple foreign terrorist organizations have called for attacks against Americans and the West," he added, noting al-Qaida "issued its most specific call to attack the United States in the last five years."
As reported by the Times of India, “Hezbollah has issued a stern warning, stating that it will target American positions in the Middle East if the United States directly intervenes in the Israel-Hamas conflict.”
Could the U.S. homeland be next?
For Biden officials, including Wray and Mayorkas, this is a dereliction of their constitutional duty. Republicans are good at holding hearings, huffing and puffing, but not using their Congressional authority to impeach or defund agencies that are ignoring their obligation to protect America and the homeland.
There will be plenty of finger pointing after an attack but beforehand, nothing but cheap talk. For Republicans it’s a brilliant campaign issue, “It’s the border stupid.” Yet they fiddle while America burns.
Wake up before it’s too late. It’s not migration. It’s an invasion.
Brian C. Joondeph, M.D., is a physician and writer. Follow me on Twitter @retinaldoctor, Substack Dr. Brian’s Substack,Truth Social @BrianJoondeph and LinkedIn @Brian Joondeph
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