Steve Rattner, who served in the Obama Administration as the head of the Presidential Task Force on the Auto Industry, tells MSNBC and the New York Times that Biden’s economic policies have made the economy worse in terms of both inflation and unemployment.
Writing in the November 16 New York Times, Rattner states quite plainly that the enormous amount of spending in the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan created the inflationary pressures that are eating away at the earnings and savings of Americans today. Rattner writes (paywall):
The original sin was today the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan, passed in March. The bill — almost completely unfunded — sought to counter the effects of the Covid pandemic by focusing on demand-side stimulus rather than on investment. That has contributed materially to today’s inflation levels.
Rattner also points out that real earnings of workers have fallen under Biden because inflation is outpacing wage gains. The chart which appears at 0:11 shows that real wages have decline by 2 percent since Biden took office.
Of course, Rattner doesn’t let the Federal Reserve’s ultra-loose monetary policies off the hook. In the Times, he writes.
“[S]ome responsibility for overstimulating lies with the Federal Reserve, which responded correctly to the onset of the pandemic by cutting interest rates and shoveling money into the financial system. More recently, the Fed has been too slow to curtail its program of buying debt, sending still more money to chase those few goods. And until recently, Fed officials were echoing the White House line about “transitory” inflation.”
As a prominent member of the Obama Administration, Rattner’s criticisms of Biden’s spending policies have extra weight. Moreover, these criticisms of Biden’s policies are appearing in the New York Times and MSNBC. That Biden is in danger of losing the Times and MSNBC Underscores how bad his economic policies are.