It is one thing for an illiterate president to commit elementary economic conceptual errors, it is quite another for his supposedly well-trained economic adviser to do so. There are only two options -
- He knows better and is simply serving his boss's ridiculous and dangerous rhetoric.
- He believes what he says. Either one is a nightmare.
The whole thing is upside down. The trade deficit is totally irrelevant, while the budget deficit (more specifically the size of government and the national debt) is hugely relevant and alarming. Trump worries about the former and makes the latter worse while not worrying about it.
These politicians of all stripes will be the death of us - yet they are only the vessels though which polices arising out of the dangerous fallacies believed by the people who elected them and keep them in the administrative state are implemented.