One second there, Mr. Wall Street Journal, your tail is showing
Robert Reich has a knack for breaking down common misconceptions and lies that have been spread by the right and "right-thinking" economists.
It's been covered here already, but it never hurts to pass around more analysis on the recent
Wall Street Journal economic fear-mongering pertaining to Bernie Sanders and the supposed cost of his policy proposals. Reich dissects
four of the WSJ assertions:
1. Bernie’s proposals would cost less than what we’d spend without them. Most of the “cost” the Journal comes up with—$15 trillion—would pay for opening Medicare to everyone.
Reich points out that one of the economists the
Journal relies on actually believes that Bernie Sander's Medicare-for-all system would save Americans $1 trillion a year for the next 10 years. One trillion dollars x 10 years, carry the nothing=$10 trillion.
Reich goes on to explain that this many trillion dollars' worth of savings could be used to cover the costs of other Bernie proposals like the Marxist free public colleges, the Leninist expansion of Social Security benefits, the Stalinist improvement of infrastructure, the Yeltsinian (?) monies to cover a paid family leave. He also explains that the WSJ likes to use the term, "costs," and then forget that these "costs" will be covered by working families if Sanders' policies aren't implemented (i.e., tuition, health insurance).
4. Finally, Bernie’s proposed spending on education and infrastructure aren’t really “spending” at all, but investments in the nation’s future productivity. If we don’t make them, we’re all poorer.
This is an important distinction that self-assured "free-market" proponents always seem to omit. What's our end game as a country? Ours is to make our country as a whole better.