Their industrial strategy and ours

Economists supporting the far right in the USA are starting to release reports to stand behind the policies of the Trump Administration.

The new conservative economists have put together competing theories, explanations, and policy programs that attempt to wrap their arms around the current political moment. They come in two varieties, trying to make some sense of the policies of the Trump folks for investors and academics trying to justify the meanderings of national policies that look chaotic for the population.

Gillian Tett of the Financial Times is usually on top of these publications. A recent article on so called "geonomics" discussed at the recent IMF meetings received some attention.

Michael Roberts responded to the concepts here. I will not go through all of that again as Roberts does a good job situating "geonomics" in the left critique (through his own lens of course).

The important point for policy folks is to be able to tell the difference between what we mean by industrial strategies and what they mean by industrial policy. Confusion over these points is going to create confusion within the movement.

Industrial Strategies of the left account for broad concepts of state intervention in the economy. These can be situated within Keynesian and more Classical economic frames. The Keynesian theme is usually where folks become confused. The far right like to take up aspects of Keynesian intervention.

War Keynesian is the part that they usually focus on, a program where the state intervenes during times of conflict to force production of killing machines and the economic fallout of over-producing those non-productive assets. Namely, procurement and profit subsidies.

For the right, because they are not attempting to undermine capital, these kinds of Keynesian economic programs support the system by propping-up industries and pumping-up the economy. A little of the things that sound social democratic: state borrowing, tariffs, printing money, holding-up wages, investment in industrial production, public procurement, employment programs, and industrial research.

These policies are outlined in these new books "explaining" the fascist programs of the Trump Administration. However, it is not just what these programs are being tailored to do that makes them far-right. The coordinating aspects of capital being directly involved, the profit subsidies, the types production being focused on, and the imperialist view is what makes them far right.

The far-right "industrial policy" program supports continued capital ownership of these parts of the economy. It supports the establishment of (medium-sized) capital through direct profit subsidies to build the machines of war, the production of domestic inputs for those machines, and the suppression of wages through union-capital-government alliances. And, of course, protectionism wrapped in jingoist nationalism.

War Keynesian economic programs from the far-right will also support public ownership over some companies. In the USA, you can see that Aluminum production companies have been started by the Department of Defence and using procurement to support those processes.

There is also an orientation to economics that is specifically imperialist in mindset. The idea is not to build prosperity everywhere, it is to build prosperity at home by taking from everywhere else. Through both barriers to trade and manipulation of monetary policy.

This includes using the arms of the state internationally to undermine investment programs of enemies (and allies). You can see this in Trump's program of forcing aligned nations into picking the least worst option for their capitalist economies, and aligning trade policy with the USA even as the USA damages the local economy through tariffs and monetary policy.

The entire program of the far-right in the USA (and elsewhere) is inward looking. Nationalistic with profit subsidies for capital, accolades for workers, while undermining wage growth and public services.

Not being able to tell the difference between this far-right program and the calls on the left for state intervention in the economy is dangerous. Workers and unions can become enamoured with the narrative calls that sound like what they have been demanding for years.

Things like attacking laissez-faire economics, tariffs that protect domestic jobs, government supports for industry, industrial research spending, and a focus on "affordability" without looking deeper can sound like worker-supporting narratives.

But, they are not.

The left program sits on a foundation of solidarity and advancement of an economy that includes everyone, builds prosperity everywhere, and replaces the economics of free market capitalism with a democratic intervention.

A left industrial strategy supports an economy focused on:

• Value creation, not theft.
• Fair trade, not suppression of it.
• Domestic production to create goods we needs, not prioritizing war machines for the USA over other goods.
• International cooperation, not expanding imperialism.
• Energy security, not hyper exploitation of natural resources.
• Energy democracy, not unregulated and deregulated private energy that generates the highest profit.
• Higher wages through democratic and free bargaining, not state wage boards that "balance" the interests of labour and capital.
• Strong, democratic, and independent unions, not union-capital-government collaborationism.
• Public ownership and control over production, not profit subsidies to ensure the survival of sustained profit rates at all public costs.
• Production building value and that created wealth being distributed through public programs, not cannibalizing public service to fund profit subsidies.
• Industrial research programs supporting regulation, investment, and productivity enhancements that augment safety, not industrial research into war machines with hopefully spin-offs for consumer goods.
• A class analysis, not a focus on jingoist nationalist politics.

There are massive differences in the industrial strategies from the left and those promoted by the new conservative movement circling Trump. It is essential for the movement's leadership to articulate the difference for workers. A right wing version industrial policies will only lead to war, domestic conflict, stagnant wages, inflation, and capital profiteering from misery.

Only a left-wing industrial strategy based on classical economics (not War Keynesianism) will establish a political program that supports workers, their families, and community prosperity.