The Return of the Gilded Age: A Recipe for Disaster

Dr. Jim: [: 00:00:00

One of the things that we need to start taking a look at is how Donald Trump is in love with the idea of tariffs as a way to. Secure the prosperity of the United States. Now one of the things that we have to understand about tariffs is that it's ultimately the consumer that actually pays those tariffs. And we can't expect Donald Trump to be.

Aware of how tariffs work and we certainly know that his voters and his base don't know how they work.

And he is often referenced a time period during the gilded age where tariffs were used to create a protectionist and isolationist economy.

s one of the presidents that [: 00:01:00

When we think about the Gilded Age. There are three defining characteristics that we need to understand during that period. It was a period of rapid industrialization and all sorts of new technologies entering the landscape. And the Gilded Age in general references a period of time that went from Reconstruction through the early 1910s.

And when you think about that time period,

You have rapid industrialization and modernization happening. You have unfettered capitalism as a model. This is where all of the wealthy industrialists basically crowded out everybody and gobbled up gobbled up everything that they could possibly gobble up.

This is where you had massive monopolies that concentrated wealth at the elite levels of society while everybody else. Was living in abject poverty.

look at the Gilded Age as a [: 00:02:00

So you look at this time period. Isolationist policies, high tariffs, protectionist economic policy, huge wealth inequality, massive amounts of the population living below the poverty line, unfettered capitalism, rapid expansion of technology, that time period from a historical perspective can be seen as a time of great uncertainty.

Almost a direct parallel to what we're looking at right now.

president in the hopes to be [: 00:03:00

To gobble up as many resources as possible.

And on the flip side of it, what do you see happening when it comes to everyday working people, all of the supports that the working class needs to survive and make ends meet are being chopped away so that the wealthy can get even a bigger share of the pie.

So the parallels are there.

And now when you start looking at some of the tax policies that are being proposed, You're seeing an acceleration to a second era of the gilded age coming very quickly to slap us all in the face.

Think about what's going through Congress right now. Now, there is a big push to pass a new tax bill.

an extremely thin majority. [: 00:04:00

They're using a continuing resolution and in that continuing resolution, you're looking at two key buckets of information that's contained in it.

One includes almost 5 trillion in cuts to departments and services that the middle class and working class rely on. And the other includes a raising of the debt limit by 4. 5 trillion to facilitate the extension of the Trump track tax cuts.

Now, keep in mind the Trump tax cuts in its original form was a 2 trillion giveaway. To the ultra wealthy. And it's no surprise that during that period with that tax cut, post tax cut, you saw the net worths of the world's richest people go through the roof while everybody else was struggling to make ends meet.

percent of the U S working [: 00:05:00

So the debt limited conversation and the continuing resolution conversation all bakes that in for the working class and the bottom 90%.

You're seeing cuts to Medicaid, Medicare, you're seeing cuts to social security, you'll see cuts to health services, education, every department you can think of, you're going to see cuts, except to the defense department.

So basically anything that the working class and the bottom 90 percent need to bridge the gap that's been created by unfettered capitalism that we're seeing right now is being taken away, and that's going to quickly lead to a scenario where more and more of us are going to be living at or below the poverty line.

ass immigration roundups and [: 00:06:00

What do you think is going to happen when.

Exports from Canada get shut down because they're not willing to deal with us as a business partner anymore especially in the area of energy, because we actually import a lot of energy and and oil from Canada.

This is setting up to be a complete disaster that is going to benefit the ultra wealthy.

While we're left holding the bag, if there's one way to describe the continuing resolution and the tax bill and funding bill that's going through Congress right now, it's this,

it is another great example of how capitalism is the model. That the elites want the working class and the bottom 90 percent to use while they benefit off of socialism.

aws that they take advantage [: 00:07:00

That is what's going on right now from the period of the 1980s to today. You saw a 50 trillion transfer of wealth from the bottom 90 percent to the top 1%. What's happening right now, what is being set up by the Republican party and the Trump administration right now is going to make that look like peanuts.

So when they talk about making America great again, here's what it means. It's going to be great for billionaires and for everybody else, it's going to be an absolute disaster. This is the time where we need to be thinking about the French Revolution because they're about to tell us to eat cake.