Promises are the stuff of political campaigns. It is also standard fare of voters that “politicians don’t keep their promises.” Paradoxically, promises, however incredulous, are sometimes enough to capture voters.

Politicians can’t resist making promises that are impossible to keep. A prime example is the standard promise to “unite the country.” In a nation so divided, the successful candidate making that promise is guaranteed to fail. All the opposition has to do is refuse to cooperate and, Bingo! He/she has failed to keep that promise.

A more nuanced approach would be to promise to reach out to adversaries, pressuring them to cooperate. But in the heat of campaigning, that approach will not gain the attention that author Chris Hayes asserts is the “scarcest resource.”

The temptation is to promise what voters want to hear, however impossible the promise to achieve. The most flagrant current example is the promise of candidate Trump to reduce prices on day one. It gained him the required attention central to his victory. Even though that promise would have been impossible for any president to keep, Trump is now criticized for not keeping it. Such a promise, impossible to keep, should not have been made, but also should not have been believed. A more nuanced, rational promise to promote measures to take pressure off prices, and keep them from rising further, would not have grabbed attention that is required in a political campaign. Trump is now in a trap of his own making. A lesson for Democrats here is that while addressing prices, they need to be careful not to overpromise as did Trump.

Prices have been increasing throughout the nation’s history. The general price level only decreases at the cost of unemployment and recession, or even depression. There is sound reason for the Fed’s target rate of a two percent inflation rate rather than an inflation rate of zero. Even a zero inflation rate does not reduce prices; it means that the general price level is not increasing. A mild rate of price increase encourages borrowing for investment as dollars to repay a loan are cheaper dollars than those borrowed. Borrowing and spending at reasonable and manageable rates is associated with an expanding economy, while not promoting out-of-control inflation.

While a general rise in the price level is compatible with an expanding economy, there are some prices that have declined with advances in technology, such as electronic gadgets and gizmos of all kinds, even as prices of just about everything else have risen. And some goods occasionally fall even during periods of general price increases. That’s why the Bureau of Labor Statistics computes a “Core” Consumer Price Index omitting volatile food and energy prices.  

Some prices absolutely need to be reduced, including costs of health care. Recent history demonstrates how difficult this is as it requires cooperation of lawmakers in the grip of vested interests, and misplaced belief in the sanctity of “free markets” to solve the problem.    

Campaigning politicians and policy makers are faced with the task of “doing something,” without making outrageous promises. A first self-protecting rule is to “do no harm.” What made Trump’s promise to instantly reduce prices even more clearly unbelievable is that it was accompanied by other outrageous promises that would obviously be counterproductive. The promise of tariffs, a tax paid by importers and passed on to consumers, could only raise prices rather than lower them. An objective of making imports more expensive by taxing them would be to encourage domestic production. But we don’t produce bananas or cocoa at home and, we don’t produce coffee except for a miniscule amount on Hawaii’s Kona coast. Placing tariffs on those products can only raise prices to consumers. While we do produce many vegetables, fruits, and nuts in the U.S., we import much of our supply of those products, keeping prices much lower than if we had to rely solely on domestic production. Tariffs on imported supplies and components used in domestic production necessarily raise prices of the finished product.

Trump’s promise of mass deportation of foreign born labor was his second major promise that could only raise food prices, as well as costs of construction; child, health and elder care; and hospitality and tourism enterprises.  

Complaints of rising food prices notwithstanding, U.S. consumers pay a smaller portion of their disposable income for food than any nation in the world. This is not only because of our technology and wide variety of climate and productive natural resources. It is in large measure because we have access to foreign born labor willing and able to endure the drudgery and perform the backbreaking, and often dangerous, work of producing, harvesting, and processing our fruit, vegetables, meat, and dairy products at labor costs that domestic workers would not accept. American consumers have long taken this for granted. Trump’s promise of mass deportation should have raised alarm, both among consumers and agricultural producers. Ironically, Trump received the votes of a majority of agricultural producers and mangers of construction and hospitality firms, no doubt believing, as did many other voters, his promise of deporting only the most “violent and dangerous.” 

This is no longer an issue confined to California and the Southwest. It was the farm boys and girls that were the farm hands of a bygone era. To operate farms consisting of hundreds or thousands of head of livestock, producers cannot rely on themselves and a couple of kids to do the work. If farmers lose their labor force through deportment, or fear of it, they now express fear of losing their farms. 

Candidates running for office are obligated to state positions on issues. They also need to grab attention in a world of short attention spans and competition for attention. It requires considerable skill for politicians to gain and hold attention while not promising the impossible. Their assistants and advisors can help explain the nuances of policies to achieve the objectives of political promises. And journalists and mass media pundits have some responsibility, although they too tend to avoid complex “boring” analyses. But it is also the responsibility of voters to distinguish between the possible and the impossible and, especially, to recognize multiple promises that are mutually exclusive.

Donald Trump created his own trap by promising the impossible. Barring their tendency of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory, Democrats stand to benefit from Trump’s ignorance and belief in his own invincibility. But for their own good, Democrats must avoid unrealistic promises that would create a similar trap of their own.

— John Waelti of Monroe, a retired professor of economics, can be reached at jjwaelti1@tds.net. His column appears monthly in the Monroe Times.