I had a disturbing conversation on Facebook last week. (I know – what’s new?) A woman said her 401(k) was in tatters because of Biden. I said that unless she had picked the worst investments ever, it should be up because all three major stock indexes hit records last week. She said, you are a fool if you believe mainstream media – they’re just saying that to make Biden look good. I said check the Wall Street Journal, owned by Rupert Murdoch who also owns Fox News, to see that these are real numbers and real records. And she said, “I don’t care.” And signed off.
“I don’t care” about reality, about the good economy, or about anything good President Biden’s administration might be doing. I want to disbelieve and I prefer to disparage. How much is “I don’t care,” or is it “I don’t know,” or worst “I don’t care to know?”
In a climate of such negativity, denialism, conspiracy theories, and straight-out lies, it’s hard to put forward a bit of good news and be heard. I have an incomplete list of things that are going well in America under the Biden administration that people don’t seem to care to know.
I can see why someone could choose not to care about the record stock markets. The Dow closed 10,000 points higher than the record it hit in November 2020 while Trump was still president, but rich people own a lot more stocks than working class people so the markets, while one indicator of the health of economy, may seem distant from a lot of folks’ reality.
But do people really not care about low unemployment, which has been below 4% for 27 months? Low unemployment means the economy is growing, People have jobs, they’re earning and spending, and because of low unemployment, average wages are rising due to the reduced labor supply.
“Help Wanted” signs are everywhere. Even in West Virginia 13,885 new businesses were started in 2023. This is a spillover effect of the national economy.
Do people really not care that 15 million jobs have been created since Biden has been president? That is more jobs created in a single term than any president in history. Job creation under Biden has been astounding, partly due to the American Rescue Plan, the $1.9 trillion pandemic relief measures passed by the Democratic House and Senate in March 2021. No Republicans voted for the bill.
Everyone complains about the cost of their groceries. But do people really not care that inflation is way down from its 8% peak in July 2022? It’s now at 3.4%.
More likely, people just don’t know that corporate greed was responsible for half of US inflation in 2023.
Corporations are keeping prices high and increasing prices even though their costs have fallen. Pepsi and Coke both raised prices last year because, they said, their products were so “popular.” Another corporate price-gouging ploy is shrinkflation. I know you’ve seen this – the packages are the same size, but there’s more air and less product, all for the same high price.
Biden is blamed for inflation, corporations enjoy record profits that increase year over year, and Trump promises to continue and improve on his corporate tax relief so they can keep on gouging the consumer. Will a majority not care to know?
Don’t people care about infrastructure? The Trump joke was that every week was “infrastructure week” and nothing was built. Under Biden, the $1.2 trillion investment in roads, waterlines, broadband networks, airports, and more means that more than 56,000 projects are underway now in all 50 states: 9400 bridges, 450 ports, more than 300 airports are being built or improved. West Virginia receives $3.8 billion of the infrastructure money over 5 years.
Do people not know or not care that the $50 billion spent by the Biden government to subsidize construction of new microchip facilities in the US has sparked $825 billion in private investment to build these factories? Micron, for example, just announced spending $125 billion in NY and ID for 2 “fabs” – fabrication facilities that alone will produce 70,000 jobs.
Do people not care that Joe Biden stood on the picket line with the United Autoworkers supporting unions and union workers? Trump went to a non-union factory and asked for votes for himself.
Don’t people care about fighting climate change and ramping up renewable energy growth? Thanks to the Biden administration, electricity generation from renewable energy sources – wind, solar, and hydropower – surpassed coal-fired generation for the first time in 2022. Trump promised Big Oil execs that if they bribe him with $1 billion, he will single-handedly end all Biden administration climate change laws and regulations.
Do people not know or not care that immigrant workers will add an extra $7 trillion to the U.S. economy within the next decade and an extra $1 trillion in federal tax revenue? Could they possible prefer Trump’s plan to round up 10 million immigrants, put them in camps, deport them, and send the economy into a tailspin?
Don’t people care that under Biden marijuana is reclassified as a Schedule III drug, a historic shift that recognizes its medical uses and more accurately reflects any dangers? That capping insulin prices at $35/month for Medicare recipients led to the three major insulin suppliers voluntarily matching that cap? That the first over-the-counter birth control pill is now available, so women do not have to schedule and pay for a doctor’s appointment and get a prescription for birth control?
The right wing media chooses not to report any such good news. The mainstream media seems to prefer portraying Trump as an endlessly entertaining drama – what outrageous thing will he do next? – while minimizing or ignoring the threats. Meanwhile Biden’s accomplishments for all of us are apparently too boring, just everyday governing, nothing to see here, where’s the fun?
It falls to us who do care to find ways to get past “I don’t care” and “I’m not listening.” The Biden campaign can’t do it alone. It has to come from the grass roots because we care enough to do the hard work.
Vote Biden/Harris and give them a Democratic Senate and House so they can keep up the good steady work of creating a strong economy even for those who don’t care.