• Obama-Biden economics have achieved more than people realize, with inequality decreasing and median wages and household income reaching all-time highs by the end of Obama’s term.
• Biden’s policies have continued this trend, with inflation-adjusted median earnings in the third quarter of 2022 higher than in the third quarter of 2019 and the lowest-wage workers seeing particularly strong wage performance.
• The tax and transfer system in the US has become more egalitarian since the Reagan era, with the Obama administration raising taxes on the rich to expand the welfare state.
• To continue this trend, Biden should focus on enacting pro-growth, pro-equality regulatory changes on a bipartisan basis and avoiding new rounds of commodity shocks.
Published January 3, 2023. Visit Slow Boring to read Matthew Yglesias’s original post.
