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There is another economic discourse By Avirama Golan Tags: israel news, obama  It is fascinating to see how economic commentators in Israel are reacting to the election of Barack Obama. When he was running against Hillary Clinton they claimed he was more of a populist than her, when he was confronting John McCain they warned he was scattering "socialist" promises, of all things. Now they are prophesizing that because of the economic crisis he will not be able to fulfill his promises. Perhaps he will only raise the taxes of the wealthy - barely - to calm things down. It's a shame the Israeli public has not been exposed to the captivating economic discussion that has recently been taking place in the United States. The more the election campaign progressed, the more former and current economists, researchers and decision makers reflected the full significance of the change that America not only longs for, but has also succeeded in formulating, based on the beliefs and values that it has not lost, it turns out, even in its bad years. Two important points emerge from this discussion. One is that the extreme dichotomy between capital and labor and between free trade and intervention is a false one that diverts attention from the economic problems and their possible solutions. The second is that Obama's economic platform is not "socialist," populist and suffused with compassion, but up-to-date, complex and based on a clear and complete political worldview. Advertisement Already during the contest between Obama and Clinton, The Economist, which is not suspected of being overtly socialist, noticed that Obama is far from being a populist, and described his economic platform as "intellectual." The Economist examined all the items in the platform, and although it was not enthusiastic, for example, about the promise to raise taxes for the top thousandth percentile and lower taxes for those earning less than $250,000 a year, it admired the agenda of Obama's economic adviser Austan Goolsbee, an economics professor at the University of Chicago. The Economist had only praise for his proposal to exempt people with low incomes from filling out forms to receive tax rebates. Goolsbee himself explained a year ago on Obama's Web site that the proposal would save about $2 billion annually. This proposal is part of an entire system which under the banner "It pays to work" is supposed to provide incentives for people with low incomes by lowering their taxes. Another item in the plan promises to establish a bank for investing in infrastructure, which over 10 years will receive $60 billion to establish transportation infrastructure, which is supposed to provide work, directly and indirectly, for over 2 million people. Goolsbee is only one of Obama's experts who share his economic worldview. Last week, Robert Rubin, who served as Secretary of the Treasury in the Clinton administration, is considered right of the Democrats and was mentioned this time around as a realistic candidate for the job. And Jared Bernstein, a leading economist at the Economic Policy Institute, which favors raising the minimum wage and establishing trade unions, wrote an article in The New York Times entitled "No More Economic False Choices." The two, who are divided over questions on fiscal discipline, protested the same artificial dichotomy mentioned above, and spelled out the principles on which they agree. Economics, they say, is not a religion. There is a time to save and a time to spend, and now the time to spend has in fact arrived (the same claim has been made by Nobel laureate Paul Krugman). "We both agree that our economic future also requires public investment in critical areas like education, health care, energy, worker training and much else .... We both agree that individual income tax rates and other taxes for those at the very top could be moved back to the rates of the Clinton era .... Sound public policy, like public investment in education, health care, energy, infrastructure and basic research, financed by progressive taxation, can also drive strong growth and business confidence to invest and hire," the op-ed read. Two men with differing opinions therefore agree on the need for an update of the New Deal, on the assumption that maintaining social stability is an economic and national value. There is a need to search for fresh ways of dealing with a market that has changed under the influence of technology and globalization, but has also been distorted because of the weakening of regulation and the abandoning of politics in the hands of the lobbyists for big business. As Obama put it, the tie between Main Street and Wall Street has been severed. None of this discourse reaches Israel, as we have said. Here, one hears only threats about a return to communism as opposed to slogans about swinish capitalism. Only a few are courageously saying that economic policy is a political and ideological issue. The commentators concerned that Obama's "socialism" could succeed are prophesizing catastrophe for him. We can assume that he really will need several years until he begins to implement his policy, and that he will encounter difficulties. But Israel should actually pray for his success. And not only because the success of the United States will affect the entire world, but because perhaps this time around it will finally have a model worthy of imitation. Bookmark to del.icio.us   No light at the end Amira Hass / Powerless in Gaza, residents rely on the tunnels. Offensive strikes Report: U.S. secretly attacked dozens of Mideast targets since 2004.

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