At this point, it’s just downright astonishing. Joe Biden is 79 years old. He has been in public office for half a century. He lived through the last period of inflation. And the only idea he ever seems able to come up with is to send people more money.
The Washington Post reports that:
Biden officials are taking a second look at whether the federal government could send rebate cards out to millions of American drivers to help them pay at gas stations — an idea they examined months ago before ruling it out. Aides had found that shortages in the U.S. chip industry would make it hard to produce enough rebate cards, two people familiar with the matter said. White House officials also fear there would be no way to prevent consumers from using them for purchases other than gasoline, according to another person familiar with the discussions. Even if the administration embraces the proposal, it would probably require congressional approval and face long odds among lawmakers wary of spending more money.
This measure would be — yep, you’ve guessed it — inflationary. It doesn’t really matter whether there is a way “to prevent consumers from using” the cards “for purchases other than gasoline,” because money is fungible. If gas prices stay high, and if people are sent money with which to buy gas, then those people will have more money to spend on other things, and, absent a shift on the supply side, the resulting increase in demand will make inflation worse, rather than better.
This is basic stuff, and still — still — the president has not grasped it. He is, as ever, an inflation machine.