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The Problem
4
Sources: CBO, EPI
The Solutions (slide 3!)
• Full employment– Monetary (the Fed!) – Fiscal policy: taxes/transfers—a very cramped debate – (and their one-two punch)
• Investment in public goods, both physical and human capital
• Better balanced trade
• Labor standards
• Direct job creation
• Kill the “shampoo cycle” (financial market oversight)5
Slack, inequality
Source: BLS, CBO, Census
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Strategies to Reduce Our Trade Deficit
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Oversight of Financial Markets
Getting away from Dysfunction JunctionDOs• Minimum wages ($15? $12?)• Subsidized employment• Apprenticeships/sectoral training• In-state tuition for undoc workers (ahem…)• Medicaid expansion (ahem…)• Fair-chance hiring, juvenile justice reforms• Infrastructure• Work sharing
DON’Ts• RTW• Kansas three-step (tax cuts, shift to sales tax, cut biz tax base)• ACA, Mcaid
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How to get there?• Dysfunction is a tactic
• The cramped tax debate vs. the revenue reality (vs. sequestration)
• “Secular stagnation” breeds intolerance
• Future orientation– Electoral demographics (forcing our issues on the table)– Preferences of nonvoters vs. voters– Jobs of the future, robots??
• The fever must break 11
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Bargaining Power and Opportunity