Curators Note: Kansas is a dramatic, “real time” example of the results of Republican leadership over time. The state is the subject of Thomas Frank’s explanation of Republican political and economic strategies, detailed in “What’s the Matter with Kansas?” Policies from recent years, since the Republican “experiment” with radical tax cuts, have resulted in a decrease in per capita income since 2010, per the graph. This graph is based on data from the US Bureau of Economic Analysis.
This should be alarming information for all of us. It is clear evidence that Republican policies are not beneficial to American citizens. Someone, somewhere in Kansas may have benefited but it is not the average person living in Kansas. From a historical perspective, it is also instructive to look at what happened to Kansas during the 1980s, when a Republican president was in office. Oklahoma follows a similar pattern.
==================================================================================================
Excerpt from Paul Krugman article entitled “What’s the Matter with Trumpland?
. . .
Or consider how some states, like Kansas and Oklahoma — both of which were relatively affluent in the 1970s, but have now fallen far behind — have gone in for radical tax cuts, and ended up savaging their education systems. External forces have put them in a hole, but they’re digging it deeper.
And when it comes to national politics, let’s face it: Trumpland is in effect voting for its own impoverishment. New Deal programs and public investment played a significant role in the great postwar convergence; conservative efforts to downsize government will hurt people all across America, but it will disproportionately hurt the very regions that put the G.O.P. in power.
The truth is that doing something about America’s growing regional divide would be hard even with smart policies. The divide will only get worse under the policies we’re actually likely to get.
