Connect with us
[bsa_pro_ad_space id=12]

Business

‘Bad Case Scenario’: Former Obama Economist Slams Kamala Harris’ Plan For Nationwide ‘Price Controls’

Published

5 minute read

From the Daily Caller News Foundation

By Wallace White

 

Former President Barack Obama’s top economist joined the chorus of experts critiquing Vice President Kamala Harris’ proposed plan to lower costs for housing and groceries, according to The Washington Post Friday.

Jason Furman, former deputy director of the National Economic Council under Obama, expressed his concerns on Harris’ proposal to fine companies that practice “price gouging” on food and grocerieswarning of the negative economic effects of the policy due to the apparent need to control prices to a degree, according to The Washington Post. Harris blamed corporate greed for the rise in prices in her speech on Friday, instead of massive government spending under the Biden administration which some economists argue has fueled inflation.

“The good case scenario is price gouging is a message, not a reality, and the bad case scenario is that this is a real proposal,” Furman told The Washington Post. “You’ll end up with bigger shortages, less supply and ultimately risk higher prices and worse outcomes for consumers if you try to enforce this in a real way, which I don’t know if they would or wouldn’t do.”

The Federal Reserve of San Francisco released research in May showing that corporate greed is not the main driver of inflation, saying that the price hikes seen following the COVID-19 pandemic were comparable to those seen following other economic recoveries that did not have not similar levels of inflation.

“This is economic lunacy. Price controls are a SERIOUSLY bad idea,” Samuel Gregg, Friedrich Hayek chair in economics and economic history at the American Institute for Economic Research, said on X. “They lead to shortages, severe misallocations of capital, and distort the ability to prices to signal the information we all need to make choices.”

The proposal from Harris would task the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) with handing out fines for companies that make “excessive” price hikes on groceries, the Harris campaign told The Washington Post. Price controls can initially lower prices for customers, but many economists argue that it would also “cause shortages which lead to arbitrary rationing and, over time, reduce product innovation and quality,” according to the Joint Economic Committee Republicans in 2022.

Prices have risen 19.4% since the Biden administration first took office, and grocery prices have risen 21%, according to the Federal Reserve of St. Louis (FRED).

“Harris has made a set of policy choices over the last several weeks that make it clear that the Democratic Party is committed to a pro-working-family agenda. The days of ‘What’s good for free enterprise is good for America’ are over,” Felicia Wong, president of the left-leaning think tank Roosevelt Forward, told The Washington Post.

Inflation peaked under the Biden administration at 9% in June 2022, with the rate only falling below 3% for the first time since in July. Under former President Donald Trump, prices increased just 7.8% from January 2017 to 2021, according to FRED.

Harris has also proposed the use of federal funds to forgive medical debt from healthcare providers, price caps on prescription drugs, a $25,000 subsidy for first-time home buyers and a $6,000 child tax credit for families for the first year of their child’s life, according to The Washington Post.

“The days of pivoting to the center to win on economics are over, even though there are good economic reasons to do so, especially on fiscal policy,” Bill Galston, a former Clinton aide, told The Washington Post.

Furman, the Harris campaign and Democrat economists Jay Shambaugh and Lawrence Summers did not immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment. Democrat economist Sandra Black declined to comment.

Todayville is a digital media and technology company. We profile unique stories and events in our community. Register and promote your community event for free.

Follow Author

Business

Premiers fight to lower gas taxes as Trudeau hikes pump costs

Published on

From the Canadian Taxpayers Federation

By Jay Goldberg 

Thirty-nine hundred dollars – that’s how much the typical two-car Ontario family is spending on gas taxes at the pump this year.

You read that right. That’s not the overall fuel bill. That’s just taxes.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau keeps increasing your gas bill, while Premier Doug Ford is lowering it.

Ford’s latest gas tax cut extension is music to taxpayers’ ears. Ford’s 6.4 cent per litre gas tax cut, temporarily introduced in July 2022, is here to stay until at least next June.

Because of the cut, a two-car family has saved more than $1,000 so far. And that’s welcome news for Ontario taxpayers, because Trudeau is planning yet another carbon tax hike next April.

Trudeau has raised the overall tax burden at the pumps every April for the past five years. Next spring, he plans to raise gas taxes by another three cents per litre, bringing the overall gas tax burden for Ontarians to almost 60 cents per litre.

While Trudeau keeps hiking costs for taxpayers at the pumps, premiers of all stripes have been stepping up to the plate to blunt the impact of his punitive carbon tax.

Obviously, Ford has stepped up to the plate and has lowered gas taxes. But he’s not alone.

In Manitoba, NDP Premier Wab Kinew fully suspended the province’s 14 cent per litre gas tax for a year. And in Newfoundland, Liberal Premier Andrew Furey cut the gas tax by 8.05 cents per litre for nearly two-and-a-half years.

It’s a tale of two approaches: the Trudeau government keeps making life more expensive at the pumps, while premiers of all stripes are fighting to get costs down.

Families still have to get to work, get the kids to school and make it to hockey practice. And they can’t afford increasingly high gas taxes. Common sense premiers seem to get it, while Ottawa has its head in the clouds.

When Ford announced his gas tax cut extension, he took aim at the Liberal carbon tax mandated by the Trudeau government in Ottawa.

Ford noted the carbon tax is set to rise to 20.9 cents per litre next April, “bumping up the cost of everything once again and it’s absolutely ridiculous.”

“Our government will always fight against it,” Ford said.

But there’s some good news for taxpayers: reprieve may be on the horizon.

Federal Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre’s promises to axe the carbon tax as soon as he takes office.

With a federal election scheduled for next fall, the federal carbon tax’s days may very well be numbered.

Scrapping the carbon tax would make a huge difference in the lives of everyday Canadians.

Right now, the carbon tax costs 17.6 cents per litre. For a family filling up two cars once a week, that’s nearly $24 a week in carbon taxes at the pump.

Scrapping the carbon tax could save families more than $1,200 a year at the pumps. Plus, there would be savings on the cost of home heating, food, and virtually everything else.

While the Trudeau government likes to argue that the carbon tax rebates make up for all these additional costs, the Parliamentary Budget Officer says it’s not so.

The PBO has shown that the typical Ontario family will lose nearly $400 this year due to the carbon tax, even after the rebates.

That’s why premiers like Ford, Kinew and Furey have stepped up to the plate.

Canadians pay far too much at the pumps in taxes. While Trudeau hikes the carbon tax year after year, provincial leaders like Ford are keeping costs down and delivering meaningful relief for struggling families.

Continue Reading

Agriculture

Sweeping ‘pandemic prevention’ bill would give Trudeau government ability to regulate meat production

Published on

From LifeSiteNews

By Anthony Murdoch

Bill C-293, ‘An Act respecting pandemic prevention and preparedness,’ gives sweeping powers to the federal government in the event of a crisis, including the ability to regulate meat production.

The Trudeau Liberals’ “pandemic prevention and preparedness” bill is set to become law despite concerns raised by Conservative senators that the sweeping powers it gives government, particularly over agriculture, have many concerned.

Bill C-293, or An Act respecting pandemic prevention and preparedness, is soon to pass its second reading in the Senate, which all but guarantees it will become law. Last Tuesday in the Senate, Conservative senators’ calls for caution on the bill seemed to fall on deaf ears. 

“Being from Saskatchewan I have heard from many farmers who are very concerned about this bill. Now we hear quite a short second reading speech that doesn’t really address some of those major concerns they have about the promotion of alternative proteins and about the phase-out, as Senator Plett was saying, of some of their very livelihoods,” said Conservative Senator Denise Batters during debate of the bill. 

Batters asked one of the bill’s proponents, Senator Marie-Françoise Mégie, how they will “alleviate those concerns for them other than telling them that they can come to committee, perhaps — if the committee invites them — and have their say there so that they don’t have to worry about their livelihoods being threatened?” 

In response, Mégie replied, “We have to invite the right witnesses and those who will speak about their industry, what they are doing and their concerns. Then we can find solutions with them, and we will do a thorough analysis of the issue. This was done intentionally, and I can provide all these details later. If I shared these details now, I would have to propose solutions myself and I do not have those solutions. I purposely did not present them.” 

Bill C-293 was introduced to the House of Commons in the summer of 2022 by Liberal MP Nathaniel Erskine-Smith. The House later passed the bill in June of 2024 with support from the Liberals and NDP (New Democratic Party), with the Conservatives and Bloc Quebecois opposing it.   

Bill C-293 would amend the Department of Health Act to allow the minister of health to appoint a “National pandemic prevention and preparedness coordinator from among the officials of the Public Health Agency of Canada to coordinate the activities under the Pandemic Prevention and Preparedness Act.”  

It would also, as reported by LifeSiteNews, allow the government to mandate industry help it in procuring products relevant to “pandemic preparedness, including vaccines, testing equipment and personal protective equipment, and the measures that the Minister of Industry intends to take to address any supply chain gaps identified.”

A close look at this bill shows that, if it becomes law, it would allow the government via officials of the Public Health Agency of Canada, after consulting the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food and of Industry and provincial governments, to “regulate commercial activities that can contribute to pandemic risk, including industrial animal agriculture.”  

The bill has been blasted by the Alberta government, who warned that it could “mandate the consumption of vegetable proteins by Canadians” as well as allow the “the federal government to tell Canadians what they can eat.” 

As reported by LifeSiteNews, the Trudeau government has funded companies that produce food made from bugs. The World Economic Forum, a globalist group with links to the Trudeau government, has as part of its Great Reset agenda the promotion of “alternative” proteins such as insects to replace or minimize the consumption of beef, pork, and other meats that they say have high “carbon” footprints.  

Trudeau’s current environmental goals are in lockstep with the United Nations’ “2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development” and include phasing out coal-fired power plants, reducing fertilizer usage, and curbing natural gas use over the coming decades, as well as curbing red meat and dairy consumption. 

Continue Reading

Trending

X