9mo ago

Bidenomics Is Making China Angry. That’s OK.

www.nytimes.com Opinion | Bidenomics Is Making China Angry. That’s OK.

Trump talked tough, but Biden is wielding a big stick.

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I honestly don't know what the fuck Bidenomics even means at this point.
- nothing tbh, they are just calling neoliberalism this because hes campaigning.
  
  Free trade is a central tenet of neoliberalism, so Biden's protectionist stance toward China is very much not that. Which isn't to say this is socialist or any sort of seismic change to the status quo, but it's not exactly neoliberalism either.
  
  Biden's actual policies and impacts are actually quite good and have nothing to do with neoliberalism.
  @umbrella@lemmy.ml What is neoliberal about what Biden is doing? I actually sort of suspect that you're doing precisely what you claim the NYT is doing, i.e. calling Biden "neoliberalism" because of who he is, instead of anything about what the actual policies are.
  IDK, maybe that is unfair and you're saying that because of something I don't know, or out of general jadedness with the Democrats. If it's the second one I can 100% sympathize.
  
  when we added socialist elements to capitalism (eg. social security, free healthcare, free education and so on) it didnt stop being capitalism.
  same thing here, this is not unlike when the US was putting tariffs on japanese electronics, back when they were getting good at it. branding protectionism with his own name ("bidenomics!") only makes sense to me in the context of a campaigning politician trying to make it sound like hes doing something new or revolutionary.
  
  One definition of neoliberalism
  neoliberalism is often associated with policies of economic liberalization, including privatization, deregulation, globalization, free trade, monetarism, austerity, and reductions in government spending in order to increase the role of the private sector in the economy and society
  What is any of that about what Biden is doing? You didn’t answer me on that, just repeated the label without explaining details or why it applies, and to me it sounds like the exact opposite.
  Or, wait, are you saying that okay yes Biden’s policy is a trillion dollars in the exact opposite direction from neoliberalism, but it doesn’t count, because it’s only an “element” and the overall structure is still neoliberal? I.e. he didn’t seize the means of production, so you can call him a neoliberal no matter what he does, until that happens?
  
  that definition you quoted seems pretty on point with what almost every IS president in my memory has been doing. a little bit of protectionism in a specific industry sector is a drop in the bucket.
  
  that definition you quoted seems pretty on point with what almost every IS president in my memory has been doing
  Absolutely accurate yes, which is what made it surprising when Biden started doing different things
  a little bit of protectionism in a specific industry sector is a drop in the bucket
  So if he were doing a whole lot more things than that little bit of protectionism in one specific industry sector...
  (I sent a link earlier on)
  
  when we added socialist elements to capitalism (eg. social security, free healthcare, free education and so on) it didnt stop being capitalism.
  This is a very black and white view of things, though. Norway is seen as capitalist, yet 2/3rds of Norway's GDP is driven by its public sector, the government owns 30% of the domestic stock market, they have a massive government wealth fund that makes returns in hundreds of billions of dollars annually which they could singlehandedly fund UBI with, they apply Georgist taxes to natural resources (oil, hydro, aquafarms) to collectivize profits made off public land, 60% union density, 20% of housing is collectively owned (housing coops)...
  Like, at what point do we call a country "socialist"?
  (Not to call the US socialist, but Bidenomics might lean like 1% in that direction, and that's my point - it's going in a socialist direction if very slowly, and if we can maintain it)
  
  exatly what i mean. its not black and white!
  
  sure, but its also not different enough to warrant a new name like this type of neoliberalism with some protectionism was just invented. you did it 40ish years ago to japan. neoliberals have historically bent their own rules when they felt like they needed to.
  bidenomics is just a campaign slogan
- Bidenomics is a mixture of things, but key among them is the recognition that MMT is already reality and doubling down on it to fund productive industries. Basically, government debt is not the same as household debt and strategic yet liberal usage of government debt can be very positive for an economy. MMT economists have made some pretty significant 'discoveries' that you can now find in the CORE macroeconomics textbooks in universities all over the world.

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