Opinion: Is European Inflation an Excuse for US Price Increases?
Inflation and Biden, Memes and Misinformation
Memes “no longer transmit intelligent ideas – they only transmit banality.” Dominic Basulto wrote that in The Wasington Post nine years ago. It has become a major understatement.
Political memes in particular are far worse than banal because they play a major role in the epidemic of misinformation that’s buffeting the U.S. and inflaming polarization. Extremists even use memes cynically to disseminate conspiracy theories and attract recruits.
On a less sinister level, memes often trivialize issues and create confusion with misleading and incomplete statements. That’s definitely the case with the meme posted above, a version of which I saw in a friend’s Facebook post.
Biden and Inflation
The meme asks, “If Biden is causing inflation, why is it 8.6% in Europe?”
The meme presents itself as a serious and factual defense of President Biden’s record on inflation, but it’s everything but innocuous and accurate when analyzed.
It begins by implying that Biden opponents are ignorantly putting all the blame for the inflationary environment in the U.S. on the president. In doing so, the meme immediately inflames the debate and fuels polarization by pitting the “smart” folks who know Biden isn’t to blame for everything, against “dumb” folks who think he is.
That insidiously peddles a falsehood because most people know that many factors are involved in triggering inflation, not just Biden administration policies. In fact, a Morning Consult/Politico poll in May found that a majority of Americans believe that post-pandemic changes in behavior, the Russian invasion of Ukraine, sanctions on Russia, and too little competition have all contributed to the price increases.
At the same time, the meme dismisses Biden’s very real failures. He and top administration officials repeatedly insisted inflation was transitory, pushed stimulus spending that helped propel prices higher, failed to act aggressively to control inflation, moved slowly to address supply-chain backlogs, and delayed the re-nomination of Jerome Powell as the chair of the Federal Reserve. By dragging his feet with Powell, Biden played a political game that created an environment of insecurity that many economists believe led to the Fed waiting too long to raise interest rates to cool off the economy.
Even so, the effort to deflect blame from Biden doesn’t seem to be fooling many. Almost two-thirds of Americans believe Biden’s policies are at least somewhat responsible for causing inflation, according to an Issues & Insights survey in June. Surprisingly, even 53% of Democrats agree.
Courtesy: Issues & Insights.
Also, whatever blame Biden bears for not controlling inflation, messaging from him and his administration can only be described as embarrassing. Biden and a parade of his officials have been tone-deaf in downplaying inflation for a full year now. Most recently, Jared Bernstein, a member of Biden’s Council of Economic Advisors, has argued that the relatively small decline in prices at the pump is giving Americans “breathing room.” Any American who buys gas had to laugh hearing that because prices for a gallon of regular still average about $2 more than when Biden took the oath of office just a year and a half ago. On top of that, Americans are paying higher electric bills because natural gas prices have soared. This week, they reached their highest since the days of the Great Recession.
European Inflation
The meme also misleads readers by saying Europe is in the same boat as the U.S. when it comes to inflation rates. The point is to minimize U.S. inflation and Biden’s failure to control it by showing that other industrialized countries are also struggling with price increases.
Yes, inflation was also high in the euro area at 8.6% in June, which was close to the 9.1% rate in the U.S. However, the euro area rate doesn’t tell the whole story.
First, the 8.6% is a weighted average across 27 countries. That rate is skewed upward by Eastern European countries and the Baltic nations, which are disproportionately affected by the Russia/Ukraine war (the war also has a greater impact on Europe as a whole than on the U.S.). For example, the three Baltics have inflation rates between 19.2% and 22%.
Second, the area-wide rate hides the fact that the three largest economies have lower inflation than the U.S. does. France is at 6.5%, Germany 8.2%, and Italy 8.5%.
Inflation rates by country in the euro area in June 2022. Courtesy: European Commission.
It's also fair to say that inflation is a problem in countries across the world and its largest and most successful economies. But, as the map from the Pew Research Center below indicates, the U.S. underperformed on inflation in the first quarter of 2022 when compared to the nations of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development and other economically significant countries.
Courtesy: Pew Research Center
Doesn’t the Right Use Memes the Same Way?
Of course it does. On inflation, there seem to be far more anti-Biden memes than pro-Biden ones because, unfortunately, the ammunition is almost endless. Here’s one example from earlier this year:
Source: Reddit.
Again, it’s not wholly wrong, but like most memes it trades pithiness and humor for accuracy.
Here’s another, this one from Eric Trump on April 9, 2022:
Eric Trump tweet, with a "false" flag superimposed. Courtesy: News Literacy Project.
Eric Trump made no attempt to be accurate, understating most of the inflation numbers under his father’s presidency and grossly overstating those under Biden’s. That said, the real difference in inflation between the two presidencies is strikingly large.
Conclusion
Memes can be fun. They also often distill arguments very effectively. The problem is that they can’t provide context or the full picture, and most Americans won’t bother to do any research to determine if they are true, false, or misleading.
The result is a vicious cycle. When memes confirm peoples’ biases, social media users will share them, making them go viral, and creating an echo chamber of misinformation. No wonder that we are seeing polarization rise.