By BETHANY MARCUM AND WILL BURGER
Bidenomics, which has been hindering American prosperity and growth for going on four years, has made it all the way to the Last Frontier, and Alaskans are feeling the pain.
The president’s solution to the high inflation, slow growth, and economic unease he abetted is to keep doing what he’s been doing – hammering the same policies that caused the problems in the first place. Meanwhile, Alaska’s only member of the House of Representatives, Mary Peltola, has been voting with the president in support of these policies over 90% of the time.
Doubling down on the status quo won’t cut it. We can’t fix the economy by continuing on the ruinous path of trillion-dollar federal deficits that fuel inflation and drive interest rates higher.
Instead, we need to enact policies that enable sustainable economic growth and end out-of-control federal spending.
Inflation recently reached a 41-year high, and it has remained elevated since Biden took office. It’s not hard to figure out why.
Too much money is chasing too few goods, stoked by artificially inflated demand caused by blowout government spending.
Alaska is among the states hardest hit by Bidenomics, with a cumulative inflation rate of 19.2% since Biden took office. That amounts to additional costs of $1,217 a month for each Alaskan, or more than $14,000 a year.
Average families are bearing the brunt of the economic folly of this president and Rep. Congresswoman Peltola.
Mortgage interest rates have more than doubled. Fuel and energy costs continue to rise due to Biden’s war on fossil fuels, so critical to our state’s economy, and the unprecedented spending on a forced transition to less efficient, more expensive green energy.
Since January 2021, home heating oil is up 44%, gasoline is up 33%, and electricity and natural gas are both up 29%.
Feeding our families also costs more these days.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the cost of staple items including chicken (up 25.95%), hot dogs (up 42%), and ground beef (up 29.4%) have soared.
Americans are spending an average of 20.7% more on groceries since January 2021. For a family of four with moderate costs, that means another $223 a month.
That might not mean much to well-off lobbyists and politicians in Washington, but to the average Alaskan, that’s money no longer available to save for college or a new home, or just to take the kids out to the movies.
In typical fashion, those politicians want to blame everybody but themselves for the mess they’ve created.
Anti-business posturing by the president and others – accusations of “greedflation” and “shrinkflation” – is hot air intended to distract us from the real culprits: the people in charge of a government that can’t stop spending money it doesn’t have.
And while prices are going up, wages are going down.
Inflation-adjusted hourly wages are down 2.5% since January 2021. While there have been some recent real wage increases, they’ve been more than offset by a decrease in the average work week. The overall result is that since January 2021, real weekly earnings have shrunk 3.9%.
Alaskans are tired of scapegoats and excuses. We need solutions that will ensure we can feed our families, heat our homes, put gas in our cars, and have a chance at a better life in the future.
That means leaving Bidenomics behind and embracing reforms that benefit everyone through long-term economic growth and prosperity.
We need to lower inflation by ending the government spending spree that diverts economic resources away from the private sector and redirects them to the crony friends of politicians and policymakers.
We need to drive down the cost of gasoline and home heating oil by getting rid of barriers to domestic energy production.
Alaskans are famous for our resiliency. But even hearty Alaskans are struggling with an economy in which the cost of living is rising and wages are falling. With savings down and credit card debt soaring, too many of us are living paycheck to paycheck.
The economy is teetering, but the president and Rep. Mary Peltola are unconcerned. They think things are going swimmingly.
They’re not. And they won’t get better until the overspending stops and politicians start recognizing the hardships their policies have created for Alaskans.
Bethany Marcum is state director of Americans for Prosperity-Alaska. Will Burger is a senior advisor for government affairs with AFP.
