Michael Barone: What the Democratic Trifecta Hath Wrought

America has just exited a biennium of Democratic trifecta — control by the nation’s and the world’s oldest political party of the White House and majorities in the Senate and House of Representatives. It is the third such biennium within the last 40 years since 1993-95 (and 2009-11), the first two years under the Clinton and Obama administrations.

In an era where divided government was the norm, it was a rare chance for the party. What did the Democrats do?

Macroeconomically, the verdict is mixed — a disappointing result for a party that once enjoyed a reputation gained in the 1930s for economic stimulus and redistribution. It’s clear that Democrats applied too many stimulus and not enough redistribution. They doubled down Trump’s stimulus spending, and would have gone further if two senators had rejected the Build Back better bill.

Another result was persistent, not transitory, inflation which, according to past experience, could take many years of slow growth before it can be stopped. One result was lower workforce participation, especially among men compared with pre-COVID years.

Even with historically low unemployment rates, one consequence is slower economic growth. Male idleness is associated with higher levels of substance abuse, mental and physical health problems, and a lower life expectancy.

Redistribution: Economic gains during the Trump years were for the first-time in decades greater in percentage terms for low-income earners than those who are more affluent. This is at risk in the coming years and beyond if illegal immigrants continue to flood the country, as Biden’s administration has encouraged. It is unclear how America has benefited from the approximately 2 million illegal immigrants President Joe Biden allows to enter and remain in the United States. However, Mexico’s president thanked him for building not one meter of wall.

Similarly, policies supported by the Biden administration and the Democratic Congress, and pressed forward by state and local Democratic officials, have inflicted severe damage on public sector institutions long dominated by liberals — damage from which they have yet to recover.

Nationally, public school enrollment is down. However, the largest declines are in states where teachers unions have pushed for prolonged lockdowns and masking or vaccination requirements.

Alternatives to the union-dominated and standard public schools are flourishing. In the initial months of the pandemic the enrollment in charter schools rose dramatically and this growth has continued. The number of home-schooling students has increased by 1,000,000.

Instruction on computers led to plummeting test score, particularly among children from poor homes. It also showed that parents were not happy with the things being promoted by schools, such as gender identity politics and critical race theory.

Higher education is the most tightly controlled part of American society. And “controlled” For universities and colleges with more administrators than teachers, this is the right term.

COVID gave them excuses to bully students — adults, legally — with unneeded masking and vaccination requirements. College and university enrollments have been declining ever since. It hasn’t even been revived by the Biden student loan forgiveness program — an example of upward economic redistribution.

During the COVID pandemic, public health agencies were repeatedly dishonored. The Centers for Diseases Control and Prevention rushed in with COVID testing, did not conduct any useful research and was given directives by teachers unions regarding school restrictions. Recent Twitter revelations show how public health officials tried to suppress the fact that COVID infection conferred immunity comparable to or superior to vaccination.

Mass transit has suffered the worst damage of any part of the public service sector. In the most densely populated areas of New York, office buildings were destroyed by the pandemic and have never been restored. New York’s mass transit ridership has reached two-thirds of its 2019 levels. New York accounts for half of all American transit users. The rest are in five other cities (Boston Philadelphia Chicago San Francisco, San Francisco, San Francisco, and perpetually mismanaged Washington). The commercial real estate industry, which is a shrewd lot, can adjust to high levels of vacancy, sometimes through bankruptcy. It’s difficult to imagine how local and state transit agencies can continue service, even with temporary funding from the 2021-22 Biden Democrats.

Private entrepreneurship is thriving, but analyst Joel Kotkin says that the Biden Democrats, who came into power determined to prove that government can solve problems and have done a lot to do the opposite.

Michael Barone is a Washington Examiner senior political analyst, resident fellow at American Enterprise Institute, and co-author of The Almanac of American Politics.

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