“The story of America in the twenty-first century is the story of chosen scarcities,” argue Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson in Abundance, the manual of their movement, quoted by Samuel Gregg in his recent essay here at Law & Liberty. More succinctly, Klein and Thompson state, “red tape is the central issue of the era.” At the root of what some have also called “supply side progressivism” is the desire for government or the market to produce the necessary goods and services that Americans should have in housing, energy, healthcare, transportation, and technology. The emerging Abundance movement thoughtfully reflects aspects of economic reality in its main observations and many of its recommendations for tackling current challenges in the American economy. However, Abundance enthusiasts show no great desire, theoretical or otherwise, to rebuild freedom for markets or civil society, or to place constitutional limits on government power.
The Abundance movement makes a pragmatic case for more essential goods and services and isn’t really concerned with how this supply is incentivized or generated. It forsakes what advocates regard as tired philosophical debates about limited government, markets, and freedom. Of course, to argue in such a way is to choose ends that justify a variety of human actions. Supply-side progressivism can take many different courses.
As Gregg notes in his essay, the main opponents of Abundance are mostly within the Progressive movement itself, especially its emerging leadership, which favors various government programs to regulate and restrict markets in order to promote egalitarian outcomes. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, and Senators Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, among others, are now primary movers in the Democratic Party. Much of the energy in the Democratic Party comes from former members of the Democratic Socialist Party. Their favored programs of not only regulation but also wholesale nationalization of sectors of the economy are no longer seen as unusual; they are becoming the main focus. Of course, if their programs became law, the result would be a severe shortage of goods and services. But as the Abundance movement shows, the rise of this cohort also offers a new opportunity on the Progressive side for comparatively level-headed thinking.
Abundance requires ending certain environmental practices developed in America over the past fifty years, which create many veto points, lawsuits, costs, and delays for construction, energy, and transportation projects. The lauded goal has been environmental protection, but it’s perfectly clear that pervasive interests have been formed around it. Klein and Thompson maintain that we could build more housing, transportation networks, and other infrastructure if the government got out of the way. Yes. As Gregg notes, numerous professionals and firms collect rents by helping companies navigate this maze of requirements. The results have been higher costs and a crippling consequence that large projects cannot be completed in a reasonable time. Such ripple effects of the environmental state now claim even clean energy projects favored by Progressives.
Klein and Thompson adopt the tradition of an older form of progressivism in their approach. President Roosevelt’s New Deal got things done. Abundance types desire a similar style of government, but tailored to our needs. We also need to build Hoover Dams without hassles from environmental lawyers, reviews, and endless procedural hurdles that hinder efforts in housing, healthcare, and clean energy. Our government is very good at paying people, but not as effective at building the public projects and infrastructure we need.
“Abundanauts,” to use Steven Hayward’s term, also want to streamline government contracting requirements and reduce government outsourcing of its work to private firms. The government should be capable of meeting the public needs of the moment without undue constraint or the need to enlist rent-seeking firms to do its bidding. When the government does need private firms, it should have free rein in choosing firms, without any requirements regarding the type of firm. Again, there is wisdom in this approach, to a point.
The Abundance movement demands results, not ideology. However, it also seems to want a bit of everything. It endorses many longstanding progressive methods and goals, wanting the federal government to actively manage the economy and protect workers. As Gregg observes, while this group emphasizes goods other than the welfare state as core parts of a sensible left project, they are quick to defend the welfare state itself and show little interest in reconsidering its size and scope. They aim to streamline government but also insist on the need for “smart” industrial policies, which for them include clean energy as a high priority. These projects need to proceed, efficiently. There’s little recognition that the market for clean energy essentially doesn’t exist without government intervention, and with that intervention—which occurs without the discipline of market prices and tradeoffs—we encounter the familiar story of inefficiencies, special interests, and bloated costs. Would that such policies could be “smart.”
The term “supply-side progressivism” is revealing because it points us back to the philosophical foundations of the original supply-side movement in economics, which later became a key part of Reagan’s economic strategy. Economists at the time complained that this approach was rooted in the mistaken belief that tax cuts would immediately boost government revenue. According to the theory, tax cuts could accomplish this and sometimes did, especially because high-income taxes caused stagnation and hidden income. The same labor and capital would re-enter the market when it became profitable. However, critics, both then and now, overlook the deeper counterrevolution, which went far beyond tax cuts.
The rise of the supply-side school revived the moral and popular support for free markets, the value of work, plentiful energy, and national independence. Equally important, it reestablished in individuals the belief that their freedom, choices, and efforts are meaningful and deserving of reward. This shift directed attention back to the active human person and to the mindset and behavior of those seeking to better their situation and flourish as independent individuals.
The original purpose of a supply-side approach was to promote more work, more job creation, more investment, and increased consumption by encouraging human effort through a tectonic belief in human freedom and creativity.
The supply-side philosophy claims that voters are wiser than their leaders. It argues that people are best equipped to make their own economic decisions. Their strong desire to better their lives helps explain why the American economy stays resilient, even with significant government involvement.
Does supply-side progressivism truly emphasize the human person’s freedom and ability to create a meaningful, rewarding life through work? Or does it mainly focus on what the government can do or permit through its authority? The current fiscal policy approach isn’t really challenged by this movement. It emphasizes reducing the regulatory state, but only in terms of expected outcomes. Although supply infusion is needed in many cases, what underlying philosophy directs it?
Could the government itself pay for and build row after row of middle-class-style housing? Why not? What about providing electric vehicles or healthcare? Presumably, the answer is that these could be supplied by an Abundance government with fewer regulatory hurdles. In a more restrained sense, the Abundance state might also support relaxing zoning rules for domestic housing and making healthcare more affordable and portable by linking it to individuals, but leaving private actors alone to pay for these things. The full range of policy options is broad.
But this touches on the core of Abundance’s underlying philosophy. What restricts or authorizes government action? Are there any reasons for fiscal discipline within the Abundance movement? If it involves the government being smarter, leaner, and more efficient in regulatory policy, does the same principle apply to taxation? It seems obvious that it should, yet the Abundance movement almost disregards the tax code.
As Veronique de Rugy and Adam Michel argue at Civitas Outlook, a movement serious about increasing the supply of housing and infrastructure—the Abundance movement’s most important goals—would also outline a tax policy that is neutral across all economic activity, taxes each dollar only once, and treats income and savings equally. At a minimum, it would question demand-side incentives like the mortgage deduction, and ensure that investments in real estate are not taxed or hindered at higher rates than, say, the production of goods. Abundance advocates at present do not do this. One cannot help but wonder whether such a comprehensive regulatory and fiscal approach is overlooked because it would shift Abundance outside the respectable liberal camp and into the conservative spectrum, removing its appealing allure to the liberal political class that desires both growth and equality.
Do the Abundanauts aim to motivate people to enter the labor market, especially at lower income levels? That would likely require fundamentally changing the means-tested entitlement system that is now a core part of American life. However, our Abundance leaders say nothing about reforming this flawed aspect of federal policy. The original purpose of a supply-side approach was to promote more work, more job creation, more investment, and increased consumption by encouraging human effort through a tectonic belief in human freedom and creativity. Something else appears to be motivating the Abundanauts; it isn’t typical progressivism, but they still seem to believe that ultimately, the government’s tools remain at the heart of economic life.
Meanwhile, the Progressive movement continues the inevitable leftward course laid by its founders’ theoretical groundwork. Woodrow Wilson attempted to dismantle not only the structure and design of the Constitution but also the concept of the free and virtuous human individual. He replaced it with the idea of infusing the course of history with moral qualities that would inevitably lead us to greater scientific knowledge and egalitarian fellowship. In a word, the moralizing of progress.
The Abundance movement acknowledges that rigid commitment to a hard progressive vision gradually diminishes the very opportunities for a decent society that progressives ostensibly value, resulting in a reduced supply of the goods any human community needs to succeed. They suggest practical, administrative solutions to boost the availability of housing, infrastructure, and other essentials. What they cannot achieve with their philosophy is the restoration of a constitutional order of defined and limited government, an independent civil society, and a free, moral people capable of self-government and economic prosperity. Those who do believe in these principles can accept their practical approach, even collaborate with them when the chance arises, but their solutions are merely a fresh coat of paint on a run-down building.
