NY Times eating GDP crow for Christmas dinner

Congress passed a major tax cut – a Christmas miracle, given their lack of legislative accomplishment this year.  The bill is en route to the White House for President Trump's signature and a celebratory tweet.  Maybe a Diet Coke, too.  Or a dozen, if one is to believe the NY Times.

The donkeys are already braying.  Tax cuts for the rich.  Exploding debt.  Ruin of the Republican Party.  And other predictable claptrap dutifully repeated ad nauseam by the media.

While, minutes after the bill passed, AT&T, one of those evil corporations, is giving $1,000 to each of its 200,000 U.S. employees as a celebratory Christmas bonus.  I thought only the rich would benefit from the tax cut and that nasty corporations wouldn't give any of their tax savings to employees!

Not mentioned by Democrats or the media is the exploding GDP.  The Trump economy, shedding the shackles of the Obama administrative state, is growing by leaps and bounds.  The Atlanta Federal Reserve projects 4.3 percent growth this quarter.  And that was before the current tax cuts.

A year from now, after the economy absorbs a major caffeine jolt from the lower tax rates, the GDP could be a few points higher.  That is unimaginable to many, and certainly to the economic smart set.

Let's go back to almost a year ago, the first weeks of the Trump presidency.  The N.Y. Times economic genius, Paul Krugman, wrote in February about Trump's "economic arrogance."  Mr. Krugman, as an aside, was awarded a Nobel Prize in economics.  Then again, Barack Obama received a Nobel Peace Prize.  Enough said.

Candidate and then newly inaugurated president Trump predicted a "[r]eturn to 4 percent annual economic growth" in comparison to the sub-two-percent growth of the previous eight years.  Mr. Krugman responded, "In Trumpworld, numbers are what you want them to be, and anything else is fake news." 

Krugman went farther, saying, "The economic fallout of a Donald Trump presidency will probably be severe and widespread enough to plunge the world into recession."  He described Trump as the "mother of all adverse effects." 

So how are those Krugman-world economic predictions working out?  Not so well.  Trump is such an "adverse effect" that several companies, in the wake of the tax bill passage, are giving employees bonuses and raises. 

Other economists fared no better.  According to The Hill, "Trump's growth projections leave economists in disbelief."  Trump's predictions of 4-percent growth, or even higher, were met with derision from the esteemed economists, "who argue that such numbers are difficult if not outright impossible to meet."

One of The Hill's wizards of smart asserted, "His growth expectations are not realistic. The economy's potential growth is 2 percent."  Another one knowingly stated, "He doesn't really know what he's talking about."

One more concluded regarding 4-percent GDP, "It's not economically literate."

These statements were made in the fall of 2016, when these same geniuses were quite certain that Trump wouldn't be elected, that Clinton would win in a landslide.  They were also quite confident in their economic predictions, never in a million years thinking they would ever be tested in a Trump presidency.

So here we are with the Atlanta Fed predicting 4.3-percent growth for this current quarter, before tax cuts, while the Trump-Russia collusion fable is still leading the news.  The third full quarter of Trump's presidency.  What happens after tax reform kicks in?

I'm no economist, nor am I a Nobel laureate.  But it's not hard to foresee 5- or even 6-percent growth after unleashing the economy.  Just as the Kennedy and Reagan tax cuts did.  As Trump predicted.

Will the N.Y. Times, Paul Krugman, or the other erudite economists acknowledge their erroneous predictions?  Will the media even cover the current 4-plus-percent GDP?  Or instead broadcast only what Adam Schiff leaks from the House Intelligence Committee meetings?

If they did report on honestly on the economy, they would have to eat roast crow for their Christmas dinner.  Better to eat it now, as the crow will be much larger a year from now.

Brian C Joondeph, M.D., MPS is a Denver-based physician and writer.  Follow him on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter

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