You can just do things?

The past three election cycles have all been about one issue: rising prices. The result: incumbents lose. No mystery why.

"The answers are simple. No one said they’d be easy. Yet until America’s leaders solve the inflation problem, every election will be about affordability. And incumbents will continue to fall."

BEAUTIFUL paragraph:

Mr. Trump says inflation will fall once the Iran war ends—details to follow. Meanwhile the Democrats promise more government, not less: more spending, tariffs, taxes, rent controls and price controls. The same policies, in other words, that produced the inflation from which the U.S. is now trying to escape.

The Hoover Institution’s John Cochrane, aka the Grumpy Economist, notes that the overall price level is 27% higher than it was before inflation hit in 2021. The Wall Street Journal reports that prices for some goods have risen 30% since 2020. Incomes haven’t kept pace. When Americans feel their economic position has declined, they hold the party in power responsible.

They probably shouldn't, given that the ruling administration at best has partial influence over events happening. Money printing usually beat everything else (#1595169, https://stacker.news/items/1595371)----) though, it doesn't exactly help to launch unnecessary wars and shot the oil price up. #1596069

No one running for office seems to have any plausible answers for stopping the inflation and boosting real incomes. The political class in both parties ought to read history, starting with the Johnson, Nixon, Ford and Carter administrations.

"Politicians are vague about how to achieve affordability. Each party indulges in magical thinking."

Washington is re-enacting the drama that accompanied the last great inflation while ignoring the methods that brought it to a close. Amidst American bounty—full employment, record incomes, record low poverty and a rising generation doing better than those that came before—both politicians and voters call for policies that haven’t worked in the past and won’t work again.

yeees, yeees... Biden this, Biden that. I think this author ascribes way too much power/influence to a president and his fleeting, dabbling administration:

Decades of low inflation ended in 2021 after President Biden injected $2 trillion in new spending (for starters) into an economy recovering from the Covid pandemic. Though the rate of inflation fell after 2022, it was still above the Fed’s target when President Trump launched Operation Epic Fury in February. Hence the buzzword of next month’s election: “affordability.”

archived/or gift link (not sure): https://www.wsj.com/opinion/free-expression/affordability-isnt-an-impossibility-391f57e7?st=eairFs