Economic Policy in this Election

Yesterday, the National Review published an article that they called a “Symposium on Economics 2008.” They brought in several economists (all fairly Republican, admittedly — the National Review is known as a conservative publication) and asked them which candidates could help the economy and which could hurt it.

You’d expect at least some token support from conservatives for John McCain, right? But that’s not the conclusion that any of these experts came to: none of them had anything good to say about any of the candidates.

Raymond Keating, the lead economist of the Small Business and Entrepreneurship Council, was tough on both Democratic candidates, predicting that either one might launch us in to a new Great Depression.

On trade, the last time we had a protectionist president — a.k.a. Herbert Hoover — world trade collapsed and a Great Depression resulted. Unfortunately, the two Democratic candidates for president — Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton — apparently have protectionist tendencies, for example, each railing against NAFTA and voting against CAFTA.

He’s not much nicer to McCain, though, pointing out that McCain’s energy prices could lead to even higher prices at the pump than the rises we’re already expecting.

This article painted a bleak picture of the future of the American economy, and despite their bias, I can’t say that I think they’re overly pessimistic. I’m willing to place a fair chunk of the ‘blame’ on the guys currently in power, but none of the policies I’ve seen from the three main candidates have reassured me:

• There is active ignorance of the problems of small business.
• There are expensive health care plans that will eat up huge amounts of the Federal government’s budget — and tax hikes will be a necessity, I’m sure.
• There is no hope of a good energy plan, from anybody. Energy prices will rise, no matter which candidate gets the hot seat.

I’m pinning my hopes on a few lower-level elected officials. Maybe Congress can come up with some better plans.