Rand Paul Wants To Bail Out Detroit With Union Busting and Tax Cuts for The Wealthy

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Rand Paul is designing a plan to bail out Detroit Republican style, which means tax cuts for the rich and union busting for everyone else.

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Transcript:

GLENN BECK: Do you think they’re going to ‑‑ I mean, to add fuel to the fire, do you think they’re going to ‑‑ there’s going to be a real movement to bail out Detroit?

RAND PAUL: I think there may. And, you know, I’ve been talking with my staff about having a Republican alternative to it because I think there is a way in an economically depressed zone to have some tax forbearance, reduce some taxes, encourage businesses, encourage people to come in and take abandoned property.

The other thing I suggested is the money we’re sending to Egypt for tanks and planes, we could put it into infrastructure. Doesn’t have to go just to Detroit but it ‑‑ across America, it would go into repairing infrastructure. And so I think there are ways that we could do it in a Republican fashion, but I will not be for borrowing any money, you know, from China to try to bail out Detroit, particularly if they continue the same policies. Really bankruptcy is an opportunity to try to get rid of bad contracts, start out afresh and try to maybe pay your workers, have fewer workers but pay them closer to what the market pays them in the private sector….You have to bring in new politics too. Maybe the people that have been voting for Democrats for 50 years in Detroit who ran the great, once great city into the ground. Maybe the Republican Party will have a resurgence in Detroit. And we can say look, we have the ability and the ideas to bring about a recovery for Detroit, but that may be wishful thinking.

Sen. Paul’s big idea is to try policies that have failed to bring about an economic recovery at the national, state, and local level for decades. Cutting taxes doesn’t stimulate growth. This is myth that every Republican clings to, so that they can justify their ideological goal of transferring wealth upwards. Paul was also suggesting that the city of Detroit bust the unions, and pay lower wages. This would be a disastrous strategy for the city, as depressing wages hurts economic growth. If wages are lowered, workers have less money to put back into the economy. Less money coming into the economy means fewer jobs.

If Rand’s solution sounds familiar, it should. These was the same kind of stuff that Mitt Romney was offering when he ran for president last year. This is the same agenda that Scott Walker has used to crash the economy in Wisconsin. Unlike Pittsburgh, Detroit has struggled to reinvent itself and bounce back. However, Gov. Rick Snyder took a bad situation in Michigan, and has made it worse by doing the kinds of things that Paul is suggesting.

Tax cuts for the rich and union busting aren’t the answers for economic growth. Detroit needs to rebuild its economic foundation. Shifting wealth upwards is not the solution.

Rand Paul views himself as a future president, but he reeks of the same old stale smell of trickle down economics. Paul isn’t offering to fix Detroit. He is trying to destroy it. If this is what Rand Paul calls a bail out, then Detroit would be better off without him and his failed ideas.

Jason Easley

Jason is the managing editor. He is also a White House Press Pool and a Congressional correspondent for PoliticusUSA. Jason has a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science. His graduate work focused on public policy, with a specialization in social reform movements.

Awards and  Professional Memberships

Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association