Deja Vu All Over Again Part 4: Democrat Inflation and the Compounded Damage of Politically Generated Economic Stupidity

Over the past three years we have had excessive runaway inflation in our economy. The political explanations for this phenomenon have been farcical, if not frightening. Over the past three years, my students have asked me on numerous occasions to explain what is happening in our economy to cause inflation. To this, I have always defined Inflation as is a sustained increase in the overall price levels of consumer goods and services. In other words, an item that used to cost $1 now costs $1.50 or has increased in cost by 50%.

It is simple. In an inflationary environment, consumers, families, and businesses must pay more to purchase the same items. Where does this money come from? Consumers have limited options that include cutting back on their purchases, buying these same items using credit cards and having to pay back that amount with interest over a longer period, cashing in savings to help pay for these items and/or not buying the item and doing without. Businesses must now cope with raw material cost increases, higher transportation costs, higher insurance costs, higher taxes at all levels of government, and more useless and hurtful government interference during a period of inflation. Consequently, this situation leads business to either increase the costs of the product, good or service that is sold. Of course, it is important to realize that based on our somewhat free market economy, businesses need to make a profit to remain open. How can they stay in business if they do not? Can any elected official explain this to us? Can business stay open only if government says it's okay to stay in business via Taxpayer funded subsidies and or political contributions to elected officials’ campaigns? Look at the contraction in businesses in Connecticut since the illegal shutdowns implemented by the Lamont administration during the Covid-19 debacle.

To get to the roots of inflation, we unfortunately must start at the top. The Democrat Biden Administration has engineered a massive overhaul of the works and functions of our economy since it took office in 2021. The voodoo policy of “Bidenomics” has tortured the economy with disastrous results, including runaway inflation. From a pure economics view, many of the policies it embarked upon defy economics (if not gravity), and are economically incoherent to anyone with the least sense of logic or reason. Examples include an open border with Mexico that has led to Taxpayers paying for illegal migrants coming in from other countries for their clothing shelter, food, transportation, and medical care, among other things. This policy has placed an exceptionally high burden on Florida, Texas and their border communities while increasing numbers of illegals flee to Democrat run cities like Chicago and New York City thereby causing massive social and economic problems such as crime, murder, illegal drug trafficking, human trafficking, a housing shortage and much more in these places. The economic costs of all the social welfare programs to pay for these multi-millions of people here illegally are estimated at $42 billion dollars a year. In my opinion, these costs are underestimated since we have no idea how much the "gotaways" or those illegal immigrants who cannot be found are costing the economy. My economic guess is that Taxpayers are paying roughly $60 billion dollars a year at a minimum for this economic nightmare of the Democrat Biden administration. (https://budget.house.gov/imo/media/doc/the_cost_of_illegal_immigration_to_taxpayers.pdf). This extra $42 to $60 billion dollars is a massive drain on our economy. Illegal immigration is a massive drain on housing costs in cities, medical care, social welfare services and our public education system. It is now common for legal Taxpaying American citizens to be ignored while illegal immigrants are getting a blank check and free hand in their "needs". With an increase in consumption and a decrease and supply and production, inflation soon follows.

Of course, the Democrat-led economically clueless Connecticut State Legislature (and its presiding Paterfamilias, King Ned Lamont the Unaccountable) are not to be undone in continually throwing good taxpayer money after bad, with such disasters always leading to increases in taxes, fees, useless and painful regulations, and the ceremonial hiring of politically connected cronies. As a case in point, I was saddened this week by the closing of a Bob’s Furniture Warehouse in Meriden, CT (https://www.hartfordbusiness.com/article/financial-issues-threaten-154-jobs-at-bobs-stores-eastern-mountain-sports-warehouse-in). However, in 2018, I had written a blog (https:/swickspeak.blogspot.com/2018/02/connecticuts-department-of-economic-and.html) about the serial handover of taxpayer dollars to this same organization through the oxymoronic Connecticut Department of Economic and Community Development, a Cracker Jack box of favors for the politically connected. But to the inflation matter at hand, wasted money and increased expenses invariably lead to tax increases, which lead to greater inflation. Even so, no one in our legislature ever makes a proposal of either gutting or abolishing this tax-consuming and grossly incompetent organization as more taxpayer-financed debacles soon to follow.

Are you interested in learning about more money-burning follies? Green energy and the hysteria and paralysis against the use of fossil fuels have led to massive increases in our energy costs in our economy. Why is fossil fuel bad? Can this be explained? Why is there a massive regression racing to an unsustainable green energy plan with undesired electric vehicles due to their cost and lack of range one can drive on a battery charge? Our economy cannot magically retool our driving capabilities for electric vehicles without serious issues in finding raw materials to manufacture their car batteries, deal with their flammability, and managing an electrical grid incapable of keeping up with the demand for electricity with these vehicles being forced into the economy. No amount of Taxpayer funded subsidies will create this Utopian clean energy concept that seems to be the Job No. 1 concern of Socialist/Democrat acolytes.

In addition, there will be long term damage to our environment with the constant demand of large wind turbines that upset our oceans and seas and murder sea mammals. Much more, our country could dramatically reduce energy prices with the reopening of the Keystone Pipeline, more natural gas use and the use of safe nuclear and hydrogen power options. Instead, the political system races to the disaster of a new stone age due to these incoherent policies.

In addition, higher energy costs contribute dramatically to higher food costs. My good friend Tony De Angelo stated on his segment on 5/21/24 on the Lee Elci Show 94.9 correctly that higher transportation prices have led to much higher food prices. He is correct in his cause-and-effect analysis of these increases which are causing massive issues for families trying to feed themselves. Still, the entire political system turns a blind eye and a deaf ear to the simplest and most practical inflation-fighting tool, being the cost of cheap fuel.

If you observe, you will see that the size of some products has gone down, and the prices have increased. The new term made up by woke economists "shrinkflation" blames businesses for this new type of inflation. Sadly, businesses must remain competitive, therefore they have to cut costs. These same businesses are also being hammered by green energy zealots to make all packaging eco-friendly, non-polluting, and recyclable at all costs. This mantra and mandate have increased costs for all food products and in some cases has shrunk the size of the product being sold to meet this unrealistic and fantastic goal of green energy. Instead, Democrats choose to blame grocers for "excessive profits" and "greed". However, these Democrats should be continually reminded that their political system, fundraising activities and promotions are the genuine source of "excessive profits" and "greed" since that money is taken out the economy and placed in nonproductive and programmed uselessness doing little to benefit the economy except for the ruling political class of both the Democrat and Republican parties. Connecticut is an excellent example of this buffoonery in its politically elite system.

America has declined economically and socially since the irrational Democrat Biden administration has taken office, aided by the ineptitude, recklessness, and cluelessness of states such as King Ned Lamont The Unaccountable’s Connecticut. Our country has seen a massive rise in the blatant discrimination of Jewish people, conflicts with the axis of evil, Iran, China and Russia, a damaging open border policy, a fanatical and economically irrational green energy plan, campus unrest and violence, a fixation on proper nonsensical “woke” terms meant to divide and cause hate and derision, and the serious, far reaching impacts of insane government policies by a pathetic and corrupt Democrat President hell bent on destroying our economy through runaway inflation. Legal Americans should not be forced to forage for food like animals, be dictated to by a political system leading from behind without common sense and to be subjected to crime, rape, and murders thanks to an unconstitutional open border policy.

Inflation is a major problem that has turned into a political game of cat and mouse with the losers being the American Taxpayers who must just grin and bear this incomprehensible destruction of economic freedoms and our country as we once knew it. Inflation can be stopped but not by our current elected government and state government and the collective disrespect and hatred they hold for America.

Deja Vu All Over Again. Part 3. A Taxpayer Never Gets a Break in The Land of Steady Habits

Connecticut is a state known by many names. The Nutmeg State. The Gateway to New England. The Constitution State. But perhaps the most apt name for Connecticut over the past few decades is the Land of Steady Habits. This name is incredibly apt and deserved as the steadiest of habits for Connecticut has been its insatiable desire to tax, to spend, and to add to its bulbous and inept Administrative State in grotesque proportions. Again, Taxpayer be damned.
Week in and week out and year and year out, Connecticut Taxpayers do not get a break from paying excessive, new, and higher taxes coupled with the daily fear of crime and having their vehicles broken into and or stolen. The Legislative session of 2024 arrogantly signaled to Connecticut Taxpayers that there will be no respite from paying excessive, new and higher taxes any time soon, and no respite from living with the daily fear of crime and/or having their vehicles broken into and or stolen. Rather, Connecticut Taxpayers received more of the same in review of just some of the brutal bills that will end up costing Connecticut Taxpayers more in taxes and the costs of goods and services they must purchase, thanks to the arrogant Connecticut Democrat Party.
As discussed last week, the horrific HB 5431 "AN ACT ESTABLISHING THE STABILIZATION SUPPORT AND ARPA REPLACEMENT FUND" did indeed pass. Unbelievably, it does mandate for Connecticut Taxpayers to pay for unemployment benefits for striking workers. Why did this pass? Why has the definition of being unemployed changed? Further, why does the burden in the Land of Steady Habits never shift from off the backs of the private sector and small business?
But unfortunately, the oppression does not stop there. These same beleaguered small businesses will now see increased costs from HB 5005 "AN ACT STUDYING PAID SICK DAYS" that expands the types of employees that receive annual paid sick leave. It will also gratuitously expand the definition of “family members” for family leave purposes. This Act will also increase the rate at which leave accrues and broaden the diverse ways leave days can be used. These changes will of course cause an increase in the costs of operating a business which will only be passed on to consumers in the form of higher costs for goods and services. Again, why is there yet one other job-killing business-hostile policy lifted on to the backs of tired and poor taxpayers and small businesses? Yet one is supposed to believe that this Democrat Party-driven policy is a great benefit and blessing to the masses, and the shrinking coffers of the private sector can be damned.
Of course, in Connecticut’s Land of Steady Habits there are never (ever) any proposals from the legislature to lower taxes, cut, cap and end pensions, eliminate "quasi-public" organizations, or to otherwise shrink and streamline the Connecticut Administrative State. But predictably, we see the opposite. As a matter of social justice and right, several bills were brought forth demanding new and higher taxes and or increases in capital gains. After all, this is the Land of Steady Habits! It is the habitual hissing and popping of a broken record, repeating and repeating the same old refrain. More of what we have heard about for the past 34 years. More money will solve all of Connecticut's social ills (like crime), more money is needed for failing schools, more money is needed for underpaid Connecticut state unionized employees, more money is needed for the big, dangerous and corrupt cities such as Bridgeport and New Haven. The list is always endless, and the results are always horrific since nothing is ever mentioned in the state-run media about The Land of Steady Habits having $100 to $150 billion dollars in short- and long-term debt along with a myriad of unfunded liabilities.
What do Connecticut Taxpayers really get for a $26 billion dollar plus yearly budget? What do Connecticut Taxpayers really receive for over $100 to $150 billion dollars in short- and long-term debt along with unfunded liabilities? Connecticut can't declare bankruptcy. It should, given its current insolvent economic state that has grown worse since the establishment of the Utopian cure-all state income tax. No matter how much your income is, you will never pay enough in taxes. No matter how much your taxes increase they will never keep up with the massive social ills, waste, and the increasing and crony driven Administrative State in The Land of Steady Habits that just keeps getting bigger and bigger year-in and year-out.
Taxpayers never get a break in Connecticut, but rather will be broken. The Democrat Party of The Land of Steady Habits will make sure of that forever.

Deja Vu, Part 2. More Bad Connecticut Democrat Party Legislation In 2024, For You. (HB5431)

Picture if you will the end of a state legislative session. The legislators, tired but fulfilled, congratulate each other, and relish the satisfaction of participating in a groundbreaking session of lawmaking and policy that sets a tone for fiscal stability, economic development, and citizen safety for the state. After a rousing address by the Governor, the legislature departs, basking in the glow of a job very well done in the best interests of the public.
And in stark contrast, picture the end of the Connecticut State Legislature’s term on May 8, 2024.
Since the late 1980's, Connecticut's State Legislature painfully ends every session after finding new ways of hemorrhaging more Connecticut Taxpayer money, taking away more personal freedoms, and helping wreck and destroy businesses in the state. The "short" 2024 legislative session was no different than all of the past 34 years of Democrat Party induced economic and societal decay and destruction. In true racketeering legislative style, the one bill that had no public hearing whatsoever and was summarily rammed through the wickets has been nicknamed by Democrats and labor leaders as "The Striking Workers Assistance Fund". It is HB 5431 "AN ACT ESTABLISHING THE STABILIZATION SUPPORT AND ARPA REPLACEMENT FUND" (https://www.cga.ct.gov/asp/cgabillstatus/cgabillstatus.asp?selBillType=Bill&which_year=2024&bill_num=5431).

Rather than deciphering needless legislative Greek, you, I, and many others may be wondering what this law is and of course wonder how much it will cost Connecticut taxpayers. The bill’s creator, Democrat/Socialist State Representative Manny Sanchez of New Britain originally created a placeholder (aka dummy) bill that has been traditionally viewed as a piece of legislation that does not contain any content, later gets voted out of committee as a placeholder for last day or last minute legislation to be inserted, manipulated, and passed, over any objections by the minority party and of concerned right-thinking citizens watching from afar. Democrat/Socialist State Representative Manny Sanchez of New Britain facilitated the formation this deceitful work of pro-union labor/pro socialist-anti business rhetoric by changing the original name of the bill from “An Act Concerning Expenditures of the General Fund,” to “An Act Establishing the Stabilization Support and ARPA Replacement Fund.”

By way of information, "(t)he amended bill allocates $3 million of unspent funds from the “unexpended balance of funds appropriated to State Comptroller — Fringe Benefits, for State employees Health Service Costs” to create a new account dubbed the “Connecticut Families and Workers account.” Additionally, it mandates the Comptroller to devise a plan on how to spend the funds to support low-income workers."(https://yankeeinstitute.org/2024/05/07/the-house-masters-the-art-of-deception-advances-big-labor-priority-bill).
In simple terms, what is the need for a "Connecticut Families and Workers account" and what does it entail and why? Don't most Connecticut families and workers work to support themselves unless they are disabled or ill, and pay some of the highest tax rates in the country? Once the $3 million dollars in unspent funds is finally expended, how much in new or higher taxes will be implemented to pay for this new socialistic program and how many more cronies and politically connected will be hired with tax dollars to administrate said fund?
Also, from the limited information that has been provided, the bill forces Connecticut Taxpayers to pay for striking workers unemployment benefits. I wonder how this is legal given the current set up of the state's unemployment compensation benefits fund given the following statement:
"You can receive benefits if you meet a series of legal eligibility requirements
You must be monetarily eligible.
You must be totally or partially unemployed.
You must have an approvable job separation; the law imposes a disqualification for certain types of separations.
You must meet certain weekly legal requirements; weekly requirements include being physically and mentally able to work, being available for and seeking work*, and filing your weekly claim for benefits on a timely basis.
If you are identified as likely to exhaust unemployment benefits and are enrolled in the worker profiling and reemployment services program, you must fully participate in all assessment interviews, orientation, and referred reemployment services."(https://www.ctdol.state.ct.us/progsupt/unemplt/claimant-guide/eligibility.htm)
Can anyone explain how striking workers have an "approvable job separation" and who is responsible for determining said approval? By allowing striking workers unemployment benefits, hasn't the state basically redefined "unemployment", and thus ruled the unemployment benefits compensation fund of Connecticut invalid by definition? I will therefore assume that those businesses currently paying into this fund should stop, as the legal definitions of "unemployment" have changed, especially since humble private businesses must now support striking workers that often receive striker’s benefits. When and if enacted into law, should this bill now go to the Connecticut Supreme Court to rule on its legality based on the state's new and bizarre definition of one being deemed "unemployed"?

But as the sun sets over the Nutmeg State, we close the door on another legislative session where non-connected Connecticut citizens measure the success of the same by the smallest possible amount of damages sustained by acts of the Legislature. While bills concerning weighty matters like pizza and puppies become law, the reality 2024 echoes the same as years past where laws comprised on hundreds of pages handed out in the middle of the night must be voted upon with no debate nor any actual reading of the bill. Connecticut Taxpayers who generally have no legal representation in the Legislature must accept without questions the horrific, complacent, self-serving bills of King Ned Lamont The Unaccountable's omnipotent ruling Democrat Party. HB 5431 is just another step in the continuing economic quagmire of the Democrat conflagration of Connecticut Taxpayers and Businesses. And it is this scenario that the omnipotent and arrogant one-party rule Democrat Party demands re-election on in November 2024.

Continuing along this path, Connecticut will be truly damned.

Déjà vu All Over Again. The New Connecticut Slums of 2024

Most readers are familiar with the timeless Christmas movie classic "It's a Wonderful Life," made in 1946. In this film, viewers are transported to the quaint town of Bedford Falls, where the intricate tapestry of human lives unfolds against the backdrop of two contrasting visions of community. At the center of this narrative lies the enthusiastic figure of George Bailey, whose dreams of adventure are perpetually tethered to his hometown's fate. Yet, looming over Bedford Falls is the bleak shadow of his wretched banking competitor Mr. Potter, a miserable miserly man whose wealth and influence cast a long, dark shadow over the town.
As the story unfolds, viewers are drawn into a captivating exploration of these two men and their divergent visions for the future of housing for Bedford Falls. On one hand, there is Potter, whose intention for housing is in his ownership of “Pottersville,” a pathetic, decaying slum where depressed renters pay their substance to this miserable wretch of a man having no regard for them nor any incentive to do better by them. However, in stark contrast stands Bailey, a man whose dreams soar far beyond the confines of his modest hometown. Unlike Potter, Bailey sees housing as a cornerstone of community prosperity. His unwavering commitment to personal development culminates in the creation of Bailey Park – a vibrant oasis amidst the urban blight, a home ownership park where people could live and love and enjoy the fruits of their ownership and respective individual visions, free from oppression.
In the battle between Potter's greed and Bailey’s vision, the enduring spirit of hope and belonging fostered by Bailey created a much better future for all for the most obvious of reasons.

Fast forward to 2024. Rather than making housing policies that foster the growth, development, and financial empowerment of Connecticut citizens, the omnipotent One-Party Democrat machine (with no real opposition) has decided to bring a New-Age version of the slums to every city, town, and village in this formerly great and proud Nutmeg state. Forced socialistic housing.  Government mandated housing. Ugly and/or non-descript buildings.  Rentals only.  No homeownership, as rental properties need to be controlled by political cronies under the guise of “Transit Oriented Housing.”  These days, we are to willingly throw away local control of property and hand it over to yet another highly paid, unelected unaccountable, (and ostensibly racist) bureaucrat with political connections to the omnipotent Connecticut Democrat Party. 
Welcome to “Pottersville-CT 2024” (aka “Slums R’Us”) . Numerous bills such as Senate Bill No. 6; "An Act Concerning Housing to make housing more affordable for Connecticut residents." and House Bill 5390 “An Act Concerning Transit Oriented Communities”, have been introduced and or passed claiming the Utopian "affordable" housing mantra along with "free" public transportation in the form of "exceptionally high-speed trains” and or electric "green" buses in some cases .  These items will sprout up so that people will no longer need horrifically polluting efficient private vehicles nor discriminatory, unjust, biased and racist private homes to live in. (These are not my words, but rather the words of various “housing advocates” that have been on this trail for several years). Moreover, the system must crush all individual vision and initiative for growth because the government and the bureaucratic state can never be anything but the gold standard in their continual quest for the perfect economic and residential train wreck coming soon to a town near you.

What the moronic forces of government continually fail to understand is that socialistic collectivism has failed for over 2000 plus years, but now is again the "best" alternative that the Democrat Party can produce as it drives both the most votes and campaign contributions. This money especially comes from those developers and political hangers on that are seeking these new rental properties and housing developments. It is a devastating game played at the expense of the poor non-connected taxpayer. Further it is laughable that none of these brain-dead legislators and “housing advocates” would be caught dead living in any one of these projects, perhaps recalling the episode of Democrat Mayor Jane Byrne of Chicago. Mayor Byrne fended off complaints of combat zone conditions in the Cabrini Green projects in Chicago by volunteering to live there. (She lasted five whole days).
Why is affordable housing such an issue for the past 40 years in Connecticut?  Could it be a prohibitive cost of living coupled with high local property and state taxes caused by the exceptionally high cost of redundant and incompetent local and state governments and/or their associated unions and lackeys?   Could it be that excessive zoning and permit processes have contributed to the high costs of housing in in the state?  Could it be that businesses in the state have a difficult time staying open and providing higher paying jobs due to the endless taxes, rules and economic burdens they daily must abide by that are force fed to them by elected and appointed governmental officials who have never run a business in their lives nor would they have any idea as to how to run a lemonade stand

My friend and colleague Tony De Angelo continually points out on his two show appearances each week that the “Pottersville” model of housing is a farcical and dangerous charade, proved useless long ago by the devolution of the “affordable” housing projects of the past into drugs, gangs, murders, and eventually, demolition. Tony asked as to why if there is a genuine (and not contrived) need for housing, why not make the units cooperatively owned by residents and subsidize them with mortgages rather than fill the pockets of dubious corporate developers? But there never is an answer to that particular question as that is not how the game is played. This new “workforce” or “Transit Oriented” housing must be taken away from local town and city governments and placed into the hands of new "zoning" czars handpicked by Hartford elitists.  (And questions remain as to why Connecticut needs “workforce housing” where there is only business shrinkage and citizens are leaving the state in droves?)
Further, think back to March 2023 and House Bill No. 6890 a bill, also known as "Work, Live, Ride" giving incentives for “transit-oriented development” within a half mile of bus and train stations, executed under an autonomous new "Coordinator" working in the new "Office of Responsible Growth" within the Intergovernmental Policy Division of the Office of Policy and Management.  How does affordable housing equate to "responsible growth" when cities and towns are wrecked in the process?  Is the "responsible growth" designed to benefit those politically connected to the Ned Lamont and his Connecticut Democrat Party? Citizens of Connecticut are not supposed to ask those questions, nor are they to question the actions or motives of the new acolytes of Mr. Potter. End of story.
Housing is a problem in our economy.  Like the cooperative model above, there are actual ways for housing to become more affordable without the state of Connecticut picking winners and losers, as it does with all the free money it gives to failing businesses in the state.  As just one small example zoning restrictions should be removed in the state with a much lower rate of taxation especially for regions that could actually stimulate real housing growth and make housing more affordable.  Or, how about a pro-business agenda that allows for free market wages to be paid as opposed to an excessively high minimum wage for jobs that require little work skills. This would stimulate more employment and taxation on its own and eliminate the need for governmental interference in the labor market. 
The current economic stagnation that the state has been in since 1990 shows little signs of abatement also contributing to the state's housing crisis.  Instead, the brainless plans being offered are reheated versions of the same failures of the past fifty years and will help create the new slums of the future. Moreover, given the current crop of legislative stalwarts as presided over by King Ned Lamont the Unaccountable, there is little hope for change in sight. 
Just maybe a different course of action might help to house those who need housing in the state. “It’s A Wonderful Life” showed us the blessings of Bailey Park. Instead, Connecticut is brainlessly proceeding to the 2024 version of Pottersville, and a new generation of failed publicly driven housing disasters in progress. When, will we say, enough is enough.