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| Here is the counterpoint to Mr Dimon points of praise for Trump
Kind of right about NATO? Trump wanted the U.S. to withdraw from NATO — and may get his way if he becomes president again. This would open Europe further to Putin’s aggression.
Kind of right on immigration? Even the conservative CATO Institute found that Trump reduced legal immigration but not illegal immigration. Trump refused to grant legal status to children of immigrants born in the United States or who grew up in the U.S. He banned Muslims from America, and when the Muslim ban was found to be unconstitutional, banned people from Muslim countries. He fueled the flames of nativism by describing poorer nations as “**** holes” and has used Nazi terms to describe foreigners as “poisoning the blood” of Americans.
Grew the economy quite well? In fact, under Trump the economy lost 2.9 million jobs. Even before the pandemic, job growth was slower than it has been under Biden. The unemployment rate increased by 1.6 percentage points to 6.3%. The international trade deficit Trump promised to reduce went up. The U.S. trade deficit in goods and services in 2020 was the highest since 2008 and increased 40.5% from 2016. The number of Americans lacking health insurance rose by 3 million. The federal debt held by the public went up, from $14.4 trillion to $21.6 trillion.
Tax reform worked? Trump’s tax cut conferred most of its benefits on big corporations and the rich, while enlarging the budget deficit. Giant banks and financial services companies got huge gains based on the new, lower corporate rate (21%), as well as the more preferable tax treatment of pass-through companies.
If not for the Trump cuts — along with the Bush tax cuts and their extensions —federal revenues would keep pace with federal spending indefinitely, and the ratio of the debt to the national economy would be declining. Instead, these tax cuts have added $10 trillion to the debt since their enactment and are responsible for 57% of the increase in the debt ratio since 2001, and more than 90% of the increase in the debt ratio if the one-time costs of bills responding to COVID-19 and the Great Recession are excluded. Eventually, the tax cuts are projected to grow to more than 100% of the increase.
Right about China? As the Brookings Institution found, Trump’s China policy only made China less restrained in pursuit of its ambitions. Confrontation has intensified, areas of cooperation have vanished, and the capacity of both countries to solve problems or manage competing interests has atrophied. | |
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Jamie Dimon on cnbc from davos
