Economic Arteries

What is Economic Growth?



11 September 2018

My window at work looks out on Interstate 85.   That road is a major artery, running from Birmingham and Atlanta up through Greenville, Charlotte, Raleigh-Durham, and Richmond.   There it connects with I-95, which then goes on up to Washington DC, Baltimore, Philadelphia, New Jersey, New York City, and New England.

That highway is six lanes plus merge and exit lanes.   From where I sit, that road is packed with traffic all day long.   But it is not just I-85 and I-95; I-81 from Chatanooga and Knoxville to New York parallels I-85 and I-95.   It is a great alternate route that avoids the cities - but it is packed, too.

So many of the Interstates are in the same situation - packed.   So many trucks!   Each one is shipping goods from seller to buyer.   The roads are more packed than ever.   What I am seeing is not endless traffic, but Economic Growth in action.

And what of the cars?   Some - perhaps most, it being the middle of a workday - are also traveling on business, just like the trucks:   Economic Growth in action.

But any personal cars that pass by are also destined for a profitable destination; perhaps not monetarily profitable, but destined for personal profit - they are destined for somewhere important for the personal lives and enjoyment of the cars' occupants.   That purpose is possible only because of Economic Growth.

Economic Growth is only an extension of that personal profit; it is the sum-total aggregate of personal profit.   Just because people combine their resources to build a company full of emplyees, makes no difference.   Whether I start a one-man business or combine with others is the same.   Every car and truck going by my window is there to build the economic well-being of at least one somebody, and for the vast majority of vehicles, they build economic improvement for a great number of somebodies.

As an investor, I see the aggregate of that Economic Growth in the stock market.   In the two years since the Presidential election, my personal investments have grown by more than 50% - a unique and thrilling leap from all the previous years since I began investing in the 1980s - and obviously millions of others are enjoying that same growth.   The market is reacting as it always does, seeking a new equilibrium based on the changes in the laws put in place by the President and Congress.   In this case, those changes and that equilibrium equals virtualy-unprecedented Economic Growth.

If anyone has any doubt what "Make America Great Again" meant, this is it:   the opportunity for each person to achieve increased economic well-being and the security implicit for it to happen.   Watch the traffic wherever you are, and see "Great" in action.   The stock market is the aggregate; that traffic you see is one part of the detailed individual actions which make up "Economic Growth".   They are the same.

Looking out at I-85, or any artery of the "body" which is this United States, remember that all that traffic means a whole population of millions of individual people intent on improving their personal well-being.   Obviously, nobody can do that for them.   Like the crowded blood cells in the arteries of our bodies, and in support of those real blood cells' well-being - i.e., that somebody's well-being - that traffic is people who are endeavoring to make their lives better, in a country where they have more freedom - and thus more potential - to achieve that goal.   And more: the greater the freedom, the greater can be those goals which it is possible to achieve.

Greater freedom allows each individual to set the bar higher for his own level of economic well-being; that translates into Economic Growth.   Look at the charts above, think about what actions by President Trump and Congress were the impetus, and there can be no doubt of the fact that freedom and economic well-being are inextricably tied together.

Those personal achievements are the "Great", and they are the most important thing in the world.   Ask any of those working to achieve them.


See also:

1.   The contrasting picture of life in a Socialist country.

2.   A brief history of the impact of the Obama years,
                            and the impact of the transition to the Trump Presidency.

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