CLEVELAND — One of the biggest issues voters say they are concerned with is the economy. Will the person elected to the White House come up with a solution to the growing costs of housing, groceries and gas, while making sure our U.S. companies grow?
Maureen Kyle asked a Republican, a Democrat and a political science professor what they thought of the candidate's plans.
Up first: Justin Buchler of Case Western Reserve University.
"The candidates are quite different in their approaches to the economy so we have Vice President Harris who has proposed rather extensive series of economic controls which have gone so far as price controls on groceries," Buchler said. "Which is a dramatic increase in government involvement in the economy and fundamentally changes the nature of government involvement in the economy. We have former President Trump whose policies are very focused on tariffs and fighting trade wars. So he has recently proposed some policies that may have the effect of shutting down the import of cars for example from China. We have candidates whose economic policies are very far apart in very different ways."
Using multiple sources including interviews done by the candidates themselves, Buchler is correct.
Former President Trump's economic plan focuses on substantial tariffs on goods imported from China and Europe, calls for lowering the corporate tax rate from 21% to 15% and says he would work toward more tax breaks for lower-income Americans.
Vice President Harris' plan focuses on more micro-economic policies, proposing plans that would reduce prices on groceries, prescription drug prices and housing costs.
We wanted to ask our former elected officials what they thought, starting with Democrat and Former Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Marcia Fudge.
"Well, she is focused very much on the economy. When people talk about inflation, most people don't even know what they're talking about when they talk about inflation. But when they talk about the economy and they say 'I'm worried about inflation,' the biggest driver of inflation is housing," Fudge said. "People will talk about gas they'll talk about the prices at the grocery store but the biggest driver is housing. Immediately when she came became the the nominee what did she start to talk about housing: affordable housing. She talked about how we get small businesses started."
We asked the exact same question to former Republican Congressman Jim Renacci. He said both candidates will have trouble passing any economic policy through Congress. But we pressed him on the specifics of former President Trump's plan.
"Look, former President Trump, I know exactly where he's going. On some of this, it is a national security issue. We don't want China and some of these countries to become stronger. So he wants to put those tariffs on them," Renacci said. "The economic side of that is much different than when we talk about the national security side of it. I think his policies again will help avoid China from growing in our country. But at the same time, they're going to be costly because if you add a tariff to a product coming in from China that isn't built here yet, then the American people have to pay for it. Now hopefully in time we can get more business back here, but that's going to take time."
Bringing it back to CWRU's Justin Buchler, we asked him what plan he thought would be better for the country. He said he didn't think either plan would be what our economy needs.
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