The Five Reasons Musk Is Making The Exact Wrong Move If He Wants Lower Spending
Elon Musk, in his apparent frustration over wanton spending by Congress, has started a third party. His stated goal is to elect more fiscally responsible candidates. While it is a laudable goal, it is the exact wrong strategy and, if he keeps at it, more spending will occur, not less.
At the outset, I want to state I share Musk’s goal of the need for reduced spending. Since President Reagan stated that government is not the solution to our problems, federal spending has grown by 350%, adjusting for the very damaging inflation over the last 40 years.
Indeed, the cumulative rate of inflation, since 1980, has been approximately 290%. Of course, exploding federal spending is at the core of that inflation – which inflation has eroded wages and purchasing power.
A great deal of that increase in spending, as you can see from the chart below, occurred during the government response to COVID. As the states shut down their economies, resulting it a huge national contraction in 2020, federal spending surged.
