On the topic of supply-side progressivism: May 2025 Book Recomendation

 

It has now been four months since President Trump was sworn in as the 47th president of the United States, and as of right now, the Democratic party is in a state of disarray never before seen since the Reagan revolution of the 1980s. It's a party with a deep uncertainty over it's direction, with many questions to be asked: will they return to the new-deal era liberalism that transformed America in the 20th century? will they embrace the populism that allowed Clinton to usher in the economic prosperities of the 1990s, or will they aim for a broad coalition, the same one that won Obama the White House. It's also a party with so many factions and figureheads emerging to compete to have their brand of liberalism steer the party. I wanted to explore a certain type of group within the Democratic party, one that is increasingly gaining momentum and support, and that is the progressive movement, spearheaded by figures such as Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the progressive movement might actually be the future of the party. In my process of reading into the movement, I decided to look into a series of books and literature that are about or by proponents of the movement, and this is how I stumbled across this book. 

I very much am not experienced in macroeconomics throughout both high school and college, but I know enough to both get at least a B and still take with me some very important lessons. The most foundational concept found in economics is scarcity, and how pervasive and critical that idea of scarcity plays into our decisionmaking. In Abundance, our authors challenges the dominance of this idea in our political and economic thinking. Throughout it's many chapters, both Klien and Thompson argue that while scarcity is indeed real, our instituitions often overemphasize or exaggerate it, which leads to cautious policies, regulatory bottlenecks, and most importantly, a polical culture that is afraid to build. This book argues that rather than focusing on managing our limited resources, we should shift towards a mindset that utilize what resources we have to create more. This is called the Abundance mindset, which emphasizes expanding resource capacities through innovation, investments, and reform, rather than placing limits. 

The book makes a great case for this type of thinking, using various policy examples that highlight this idea in motion, such as Operation Warp Speed, the I-95 bridge collapse recovery efforts, and YIMBYism, while also showcasing the failures of a scarcity mindset, such as the California High-Speed rail, and the housing crisis. Known proponents of abundance policy-making include Boston mayor Michelle Wu, and California governor Gavin Newson, whose policies have yield great results (significantly more so in Boston), such as streamlining zoning approvals. 

Overall, this book is very informative and is certainly an eye-opener, and I think this book might revitalize some interest in politics for me. I give this book a 4.