Commentary
Keynesian policies are damaging what they were intended to support. No example is more evident than what’s occurring in the United States. A few years ago, in 2021, I had a conversation with the economist Judy Shelton wherein she said that the recovery would be much stronger without the stimulus package, and she was right. Massive government spending and currency printing have left a much weaker labor market and poorer citizens.
In June, nonfarm payrolls increased by 209,000, the smallest advance since the end of 2020, after two consecutive downward revisions in the prior months, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). If we look at employment statistics beyond the headline unemployment rate, we can see that the labor force-participation rate was 62.6 percent for the fourth consecutive month, and the employment-to-population ratio, at 60.3 percent, was unchanged over the month, according to the BLS. Both measures remain below pre-pandemic levels (63.3 percent and 61.1 percent, respectively) after years of enormous entitlement and spending programs….