From: rja@redwood26.cray.com (Russ Anderson)
Newsgroups: sci.econ,talk.politics.misc
Subject: Tom Peter's view
Date: 30 Sep 92 17:40:42 GMT
Organization: The 1991 World Champion Minnesota Twins!
Originator: rja@redwood26


  ECONOMIC VISIONS BLURRED BY DEFICIT REALITIES
  By Tom Peters

  Does this election make a difference?  Consider the question in
  two parts, the economy and "other".  Other - including the environment,
  Pat Buchanan's Holy War and the next several hundred federal judicial
  appointments - makes a huge diference.  I have strong views about
  other, but they mostly have no place in this column.

  As to the economy, the election, sadly, will probably make little
  difference.  Ronald Reagan gave us almost 20 million new jobs
  (although no more, per annum, than Jimmy Carter).  But he also,
  with the connivance of Congress, saddled us with a monumental budget
  deficit that leaves the next commander in chief little room to manuver.

  I'm of the school that says there are worse things than a sizable 
  deficit - although we've about reached the limit of that view.  We
  obviously need to bump the economy hard and fast, with a significant 
  tax cut or a burst of federal spending.  But the deficit says no to
  both tactics.

  The greater long term need is to boost business and create jobs via
  the right sort of investment:

    * Infrastucture redevelopment.  Bridges and highways are rotting.
    The fiber-optic age may be at hand, but good roads still count.

    * R & D spending.  While I'm opposed to most government-supported
    business consortia, I'm all for research and development incentives,
    including generous basic research funding for universities and
    federal labs and strong, long-term R & D tax incentives for all
    business.

    * Universities and colleges.  K-12 problems nonwithstanding, the 
    heart of brain development is an extensive network of well-supported
    research universities and, equally important, healthy two-year and
    four year colleges.  Institutes of higher learning are tomorrow's
    economic bedrock.

    * Training.  It's the best investment we can make.  A long term 
    commitment to human capital development should give businesses a
    substantial investment tax credit for all training and offer 
    individuals tax credits and low-cost loans to encourage lifetime
    training for all.

  Franklin Roosevelt gave us a high-priced social revolution that even
  foes admit saved our system.  Lyndon Johnson overdid it and 
  inadvertently launched the entitlements society.  Now we need a new
  social revolution to develop brainware for the business and jobs of 
  the 21st century - that is, a training and knowledge-development
  revolution.  Bill Clinton understands this.  Several of George Bush's
  programs address the issue, but, as usual, with little coherence and
  even less conviction.

  Trouble is, thanks to the deficit, we can't afford such efforts now
  or in the foreseeable future.

  But if Clinton understands what's needed for a people- and knowledge-
  based revolution, would the certain-to-be-Democratic Congress buy it?
  That may be the rub.  Although the Democrats might behave during the 
  first 100 days of a Clinton regime, I suspect they'd soon return to 
  their myoptic ways.

  There's also the matter of free trade and entrepreneurship, where
  Clinton's marks are equivocal.  Clinton broke with the orthodox liberal
  wing of his party years ago, but his pander potential on trade is
  troublesome and he travels with several economic gurus who are thinly
  disguised protectionists.  Of course, Reagan and Bush, who talked a
  good game on free trade, have blythly overseen the greatest increase
  in U.S. protectionism since the woeful '30's - with the help of House
  Majority Leader Dick Gephardt and friends, to be sure.

  On entrepreneurship, Clinton is no Jack Kemp.  Neither is Bush, pal 
  to the Fortune 500 in the time-honored, big-business Republican
  tradition.  Clinton sings from the right page of the hymnal, but he and
  his advisors, as far as I can tell, accord entrepreneurship a small
  role in the scheme of things.

  Somehow, I wish we could skip directly to 1996 and have a Kemp-Clinton
  contest right now.  Deficit-induced constraints or not, there'd be a
  real choice between distinct economic visions - and perhaps an election
  that would save us from presidential pit bull Mary Matalin and the 
  politics of prevarication that seem destined to preoccupy us for the
  next several weeks.
  
  (reprinted in the Minneapolis Star Tribune, Tues, Sept 29, 1992)
-- 
Russ Anderson    |  Disclaimer: Any statements are my own and do not reflect
------------------              upon my employer or anyone else.  (c) 1992
EX-Twins' Jack Morris, 10 innings pitched, 0 runs (World Series MVP!)