Polls Say It's the Economy -- Now What?

The recent polls showing a dead-heat race between Obama and McCain also indicate that economic issues are the single most important concern for voters, by far. And few people seem to feel that either candidate is doing much to address the underlying problems.

McCain has sidestepped the issue by attacking Obama and calling for more off-shore drilling as a panacea for higher gas and energy prices. It isn't, but it has the virtue of simplicity, and higher gas costs are something almost all Americans -- except those like me and my 8 million neighbors who live in New York City -- can relate to. Obama has had a more nuanced approach and a very specific tax plan, but to date, his agenda hasn't fully connected on a national level.

The problem is that while most Americans say that they have economic concerns, those concerns aren't at the end of the day the same. We may share economic anxiety, but the economic realities in suburban Virginia or Houston are worlds apart from the situation in greater Detroit, Las Vegas, swaths of southern Florida, or large parts of the central and southern California. In spite of overall weakness in economic data, some parts of the country are doing fine, and others are in a horrendous downturn that is getting deeper by the week.

And the reasons for the strength or weakness aren't the same. Michigan and Ohio are experiencing deep recession because of the continued and sharp collapse of the US auto industry, especially in the face of the slack demand for SUVs. Florida is suffering from the bottoming of residential real estate, while greater Las Vegas is in a funk because of both decreasing casino revenues and over-development both commercial and residential. Meanwhile, Houston is booming because of oil prices, as it much of southern Texas, Silicon Valley is doing just fine graced with high-tech revenues, and Omaha is buoyed by a series of services industries that have been expanding.

The huge variability between different states makes it very hard for any candidate to run on a coherent economic platform that has national appeal. The national dialogue assumes that we are all in the same boat, but we're not. Geographic differences mean everything, not to mention income differences. The candidates can talk economy, but they are both left trying to sustain a fiction of national economy when none really exists.

The other problem is that while everyone may focus on the economy, it is difficult to get people passionate about economic issues -- unless there is a crime or a crisis that is simple and clear. The disintegration of Fannie and Freddie may have serious ramifications for the housing market writ large, but try explaining what they do in simple language that has visceral appeal. You can't. Most of the issues are wonky in nature and just don't play well on the campaign trail.

For now, it's an odd campaign season, because the issue that voters are most focused on means so many different things even though it's all lumped under "the economy." An answer in one state or region isn't likely to play so well in another, and voters may continue to feel as if no one is actually addressing their needs. The greatest common denominator of national campaigning is for now compounding the ennui, rather than generating enthusiasm, because the one-size-fits-all messaging isn't working.

The conventions, with all their pomp and staged-managed circumstance, will refocus attention on the campaigns, as will the fall sprint. But in order to connect more widely, each candidate has to be mindful of the differences even as they seek to create a national message. The one who squares that circle will win.

Comments

[Archie1955]

I can't understand why anyone would consider McCain to be an expert on the economy. Wasn't he part of the Republican team that destroyed it over the last 8 years? Didn't the last Democratic president not leave almost 300 billion dollars in the till for the next president, good old Bush? Didn't Bush and his gang of Republican imbeciles immediately use that up and run the whole country into the hole? So why would someone (McCain) responsible for today's problems be a person to trust to make them better? Only dodos would consider electing McCain, because he is so intelligent when it comes to the economy.

[AcitizenNJ]

What I find interesting here is the lack of posted comments on this issue. The post regarding the number of McCains properties draws over 1,000 comments while this post gets a hand full. We constantly are feed results of polling data about how Americans feel about the issues but here is another example that the greatest issues of our time is over shadowed by of all things, the number of houses one man owns.

Well Mr. Karabell, Polls Say It's the Economy -- Now What?, I think that people that follow the economy generally understand what you have stated because as you state, "NOW WHAT?" we are waiting.

[mommadona]

Simple:

"IT'S THE INFRASTRUCTURE, STUPID"...

"IT'S THE COMMUNITY, STUPID"

"GLOBAL WAR OR NATIONAL SECURITY?"

"MILITARY/INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX OR NATIONAL INFRASTRUCTURE?"

"LIFE OR DEATH AS A NATIONAL SECURITY POLICY?"

and when you get right down to it:

WAR MONGERS OR PEACE?

Mc Cain IS the Military/Industrial Complex - Daddy Warbucks.

NEW PRIORITIES = NEW FOCUS = NEW NATIONAL INTERESTS.

[PALinda]

FWIW, the HuffPo article "Obamanomics" links to an upcoming article from NYT It recountes a reporter's interesting and somehwat lengthy discuss w Obama on his economic plan and his nuanced philosophy.

We hoi polloi may find it digestible, regardless of our individual tastes.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/24/magazine/24Obamanomics-t.html?_r=
1&adxnnl=1&oref=slogin&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss&pagewanted=print&adxnnlx=
1219395793-ZSzo5xTOc/fYY3EErwGCRg

[swift goat pet for truth]

"The problem is that while most Americans say that they have economic concerns, those concerns aren't at the end of the day the same."

No.
The problem is that most Americans have no understanding of how the economy works.
ALL trhe Republicans have no understanding of how the economy works. The last 28 years has proved that.

[DocTwain]

PART I

Part I seems to have been omitted. All it pointed out was that

1. the health insurance crisis is above all an economic issue, which affects 50 million uninsured, scores of millions more underinsured. It causes extreme financial stress and often bankruptcy. Problem: the private health insurance and pharmaceutical cartels.

2. the trillion-dollar profiteering Iraq War is an economic issue, as are the supply-side tax cuts for the rich. Together they result in a situation with a 10 trillion dollar national debt--while payroll taxes increase. Problem: war cartel, supply-side tax code.

3. the energy crisis is an economic issue. $4/gallon gas. Energy-driven inflation. Detroit unable to sell SUVs, which it only produced in the first place because of the hegemony of big oil. No public transit. No clean energy. All economic issues. Problem: the fossil fuel cartels.

4. the mortgage crisis, bailouts for financial firms, credit card fee abuses, unfair bankruptcy laws. problem: finance cartel. All economic problems.

The important thing is to unite all of these ills--and others--in a big picture: that Republicans have turned government into a tool for the industrial cartels to squeeze the working class and funnel their prosperity to the rich. You could even admit that Democrats have helped them and then say in stentorian tones, Never Again.

If you don't think a full-frontal populist attack on the plutocracy would stir up Independents, you're nuts.

[riverhippie]

And all these problems came about in the last eight years?

Man that Bush is an effective guy.

[loudspeaker]

I would go so far as to say that America has been destroyed economically ON PURPOSE by the financial elite centered on Wall Street and abroad in for instance City of London. All economic policies the latest 40-odd years have been designed to suck out wealth from the lower 90% of Americans through such clever tricks as privatization, deregulation, free trade, globalization, drug trade, HMOs, etc.

I think that the Huffington Post should write more about matters like that and not so much about how hard it is for presidential candidates to formulate economic policies that will appeal to everybody. Let's face it: to write about how EXTREMELY EASY it would be to formulate economic policies that would appeal to the vast majority of the lower 90% of Americans would be EXTREMELY UNPOPULAR among the upper 1% of Americans (and other wealthy people abroad).

[allwrite]

Brother, did you ever get it right! . . and succinctly stated too.

I would go back to 1980 and pick up Reagan's laissez faire/deregulation philosophy and add that to your mix. We have had, for all intents and purposes, 30 years (maybe more) of Republican dominance on economic policy. What have we to show for it? One greed generated financial crisis after another.

[demfriend]

I recently read about Bg Pharma in the US and how it is struggling due to a lack in new drugs coming down the pipline and the costs of fuel and doing business right now. Well the fear monkey has escaped again and now the words from people who work in the pharma world are saying they have to not vote for Obama or they will lose their jobs. Funny thing though is Big Pharma has already been cleaning house of a lot of the people working for them in the US but these monkeys are selling the idea that Big Pharma will die because Obama will make them pay taxes. The word from these monkeys goes on to share that Mccain will guarentee the jobs because of the people working with Mccain to save US jobs!! I went between disbelief anger and laughter in too short a time and got me a headache!!! When one looks too close at Mac he has sold many jobs overseas and cares little about keeping the majority left over. It all lobbyists. But the fear monkeys are busy and doing their best to got republican which doesn't surprise me as the majority of the Pharma sales and management is known to be republican. They are just now adding FEAR MONKEY to their titles!!

[larry278]

Hey, that's OK. Have you ever read anything written by any economist? Logic isn't their long suit. Examine the syntax which an economist uses. An economist can use 500,000 words & not say anything.

[DocTwain]

Part III

Square the circle: make EVERYTHING an economic issue.

[loudspeaker]

Hey DocTwain, you should write up something to be published on Huffington Post.

[DocTwain]

Part II

So it is false to say that there is no national economy. The health care, fossil fuel, war, and finance cartels and the plutocratic tax code of the supply-side ultra-rich have combined to create an economic malaise that is destroying the prosperity of the lower 80% of Americans.

Karabell, you want to square the circle?

The master narrative is this:

Supply-side and cartelist Republicans, including McCain, have deliberately and systematically turned government into a tool of the industrial cartels (war, fossil fuel, health care, finance) and the ultra rich in their plutocratic attack on working Americans' prosperity and future.

ALL of the economic issues must be LINKED, as they ARE, by the master narrative of PLUTOCRACY.

The Iraq War and the health care crisis and the energy crisis and the mortgage crisis are all the fruit of the Reaganite supply-side/cartelist plutocratic ideology.

Republicans accuse us of big government: we must accuse them of plutocratic government, paint them as the ENEMY of ALL working Americans of every political party.

We need true, honest-to-God Rooseveltian passionate progressive populism. It will get everyone excited, except the ultra-rich & Republican leadership, whom it will terrify.

This is the ONLY narrative that will win over Independents in large numbers--because it is the hideous truth: the elephant in the middle of the room.

That truth is the source of power for Democratic victory.

[loudspeaker]

Well written. Just to clarify one thing: America urgently needs a new New Deal and other FDR-like monetary-financial-economic measures.

[UnbiasView]

What a shock, it isn't global warming or universal healthcare like the Dems thought at the begining of the campaign.

[swift goat pet for truth]

That is correct. It is the economy.

And 28 years of GOP policy has proven the GOP does not know how to manage the economy, nor sustain the dollar for the average American.