There is much in the news these days regarding Trump’s proposed tariff regime. There are talks of levying up to 60 percent tariffs on all goods coming from China and possibly 10 to 20 percent tariffs on everything else imported to this country. The last time Trump instituted wide ranging tariffs, there was a system in place to allow companies to apply for relief from these tariffs. Thousands of requests were filed for relief. Lobbying firms saw huge increases in business. Unfortunately, relief from tariffs was granted on what seemed to be a somewhat random basis. Some companies won and some companies didn’t fair as well. It certainly seems like it’s a system ripe for abuse and corruption. However, given the integrity demonstrated by so many in the previous Trump administration, I’m sure we have nothing to worry about – not!
Couple this with the current situation in which companies, foundations and individuals can donate virtually unlimited funds to SuperPACs which ultimately benefit elected officials. We can thank the John Roberts Supreme Court for that gift due to the Citizens United ruling in 2010. Add in a new administration filled with Trump sycophants and a Justice Department that will view its duty to be to protect Trump rather than protecting the U.S. Constitution. Top it off with the recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling granting Trump ‘limited immunity,’ and it certainly seems like a recipe for corruption on a grand scale to be financed by American citizens.
Economists love metrics and I would like to propose a new metric that will, in some sense, measure how effective a particular administration is at lining their own pockets versus lining the pockets of the American people and looking out for their well-being. Virtually all politicians justify their decisions by claiming they are making them for the benefit of the people. We should put that to the test. There are already metrics on the overall wealth gap – which, by the way, is getting larger – but that is at a very broad level. The metric I am proposing would be at a much more granular and personal level.
I would propose we start tracking the net worth of cabinet level administration officials at the beginning of the term of office and compare that to the average net worth of the American population. Or perhaps another variant could be to compare the net worth of administration officials to the percentage of people below the poverty level as defined by the U.S. government.
The most important thing is to track the individual and overall net worth of cabinet level officials. If there is a huge divergence between the increase in cabinet level wealth and citizen wealth, it will easily show the decisions made were, in fact, not in the best interest of the people. If the two metrics track fairly well, then we can assume the decisions made were probably not made solely for benefitting the individuals making those decisions.
We could call these metrics for each individual the CEI (Cabinet Effectiveness Index) and also have an OCEI (Overall Cabinet Effectiveness Index). A lower index would be better whereas a higher index would indicate the administration made decisions primarily to benefit themselves (and by corollary their wealthy and powerful friends) rather than the America people.
In short, we could simply refer to it as the OI – Oligarch Index. And, if I were a betting man, I would bet that at the end of the next Trump administration, it is through the roof. I suspect many of the ardent “working class” Trump supporters who believed he was going to help them, are going to be in for a big dose of reality when the new cast of the Trump circus start pulling on the levers of power.
