Bad Times = Big Government?
Michael Barone offers a thought-provoking observation.
It seems to me that two assumptions that Obama carried into the White House — assumptions that were shared by many who hadn't voted for him — have proved to be unfounded.
The first is that economic distress would lead more Americans to favor big-government policies. The second is that Obama's personal characteristics and his repudiation of many of his predecessor's policies would change the minds of America's critics and enemies.
If Obama did carry assumption 1 with him, he was heading for trouble. The record suggests that America's major social programs are more typically enacted in good times, not bad. Think: Medicare part D during the post-9/11 recovery, S-Chip during the 1990s boom, Medicare and Medicaid in 1965. Social Security might seem an exception, but it's not: 1935 was a year of sizzling economic growth, as had been 1934 before it.
It's not impossible to create a program in bad times - Supplemental Security Income and the Earned Income Tax Credit were both enacted in the mid-1970s slump - but it's much harder.
As voters as well as consumers, Americans spend when they feel flush.