Presidential candidate Ted Cruz spoke at length about the American economy Friday morning, making a case that a return to robust growth would help alleviate myriad problems troubling the country’s fiscal health.
Speaking to CNBC, Cruz flatly stated without a new era of economic prosperity, all other efforts to restore the United States’ financial standing will be for naught.
“Growth is foundational. My number one priority as president will be economic growth. Every other problem we’ve got — whether it’s unemployment, whether it’s the debt and the deficit, whether it is strengthening and preserving Social Security and Medicare, or whether it is rebuilding our military and keeping us safe — you got to have growth to make it work,” Cruz said. “We have been trapped in stagnation for the last seven years. And if we don’t turn that around, nothing else gets fixed.”
Cruz said that the U.S. economy’s modest expansion in recent years — the country’s gross domestic product hasn’t grown more than 3 percent in a year in a decade, a rate that was achieved 30 times between 1961 and 2004 — has made the nation’s challenges “not solvable”. A return to historic averages of growth would change that in a hurry, Cruz said.
“If you get back to historic levels — 3-, 4-, 5-percent growth — suddenly the federal budget numbers turn around dramatically. It is by far the biggest factor impacting the federal budget.”
Cruz’s economic agenda incorporates a mother lode of conservative principles, but his tax policy is particularly aggressive. His approach of simplification and lowering rates would leave individuals paying a flat tax of 10 percent, impose a 16-percent tax on business profits less capital investment, and eliminate a bevy of additional taxes, like the payroll tax and the estate tax. The plan has earned both praise and skepticism from the right, and divided opinions among economists.
Check out more of Cruz’s interview here.
