Book description
A provocative critique of the Obama administration's economic
policies and an examination of America's difficult economic future
During the 2008 presidential campaign, Barack Obama promised "a
net spending cut" to make government smaller in order to reduce
the deficit. But this huge increase in government spending and debt,
and the resulting prospect of higher taxes, will make America a poorer
country. Are Americans happier because the government has determined
where this money should be spent? According to John Lott and Americans
for Tax Reform President Grover Norquist, the answer is no, and in
Debacle: Obama's War on Jobs and Growth and What We Can Do Now to
Regain Our Future they explain why.
Obama's economic policies have raised unemployment, slowed economic
growth, dramatically raised the national debt, squandered taxpayer
money through poor investments, and damaged the housing market. The
book explains why Obama's policies on spending, taxes, and regulation
have all worked to harm the recovery, increase unemployment, and
depress housing prices.
- The Congressional Budget Office estimates that the deficits that
President Obama proposes for the years from 2011 through 2020 come
to a staggering 6,000 per family of four, and John Lott and Grover
Norquist make clear why the costs outweigh the benefits
- Explains why Keynesian economics is more a way of transferring
wealth to political constituencies than a legitimate economic
theory for understanding how the economy operates
- Posits that Obama's economic policies were more an opportunity
"to do big things" than to solve the country's economic problems
Arguing that the policies of the Obama administration have created
widespread economic chaos, Debacle is a bleak look at American
finance from Grover Norquist.
Grover G. Norquist is President of Americans for
Tax Reform (ATR), a taxpayer advocacy group he founded in 1985 at the
request of President Reagan. ATR is a coalition of taxpayer groups,
individuals, and businesses opposed to higher taxes at the federal,
state, and local levels. It organizes the Taxpayer Protection Pledge,
which asks all candidates for federal and state office to commit
themselves in writing to oppose all tax increases.
John R. Lott, Jr is an economist who has held research and/or
teaching positions at the University of Chicago, Yale, Stanford, UCLA,
Wharton, and Rice, and was the chief economist at the United States
Sentencing Commission from 1988 to 1989. Lott has published over 100
articles in academic journals. He has authored six books including
More Guns, Less Crime; Freedomnomics; The Bias Against Guns;
and Are Predatory Commitments Credible? He is a contributor and
a weekly columnist for FoxNews. com. Lott's Opinion pieces have
appeared in several publications, including the Wall Street
Journal, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times,
the New York Post, USA Today, and the Chicago Tribune,
and he has appeared on television programs including ABC and NBC
National Evening News broadcasts, Fox News, The NewsHour with Jim
Lehrer, and the Today Show. He received his PhD in
economics from UCLA.
