WASHINGTON — Donald Trump, who holds a Ivy League college degree in economics, claimed in an interview published Thursday that he recently…
WASHINGTON — Donald Trump, who holds an Ivy League college degree in economics, claimed in an interview published Thursday that he recently invented the term „priming the pump“ to describe his approach to presidential stewardship of the U. S. economy.
„It’s called priming the pump. You know, if you don’t do that, you’re never going to bring your taxes down, “ he said, defending a push to cut taxes even if that reduces revenue and drives up the federal deficit.
The term has been in use for nearly a century and is a common way for economists and policymakers to describe stimulus effects of government spending or tax cuts.
Trump invoked the term in an interview with The Economist, which asked him to contrast „Trumpanomics“ with orthodox Republican policy.
„It is OK, because it won’t increase it for long. You may have two years where you’ll… you understand the expression `prime the pump?‘ “ Trump said. „We have to prime the pump.“
„Yes, “ the interviewer responded, according to the transcript the Economist posted, affirming an understanding of the phrase. „It’s very Keynesian.“
„Have you heard that expression used before? Because I haven’t heard it. I mean, I just… I came up with it a couple of days ago and I thought it was good. It’s what you have to do, “ Trump said.
The word mavens at Merriam-Webster begged to differ.
Trump critics were fishing for an authoritative etymology but the phrase was certainly in use during the Great Depression and New Deal era in the early 1930s, when President Franklin D. Roosevelt used federal spending to combat widespread unemployment and poverty.
A book titled Pump-priming Theory of Government Spending was published in 1939 as a handy reference for college debaters. It’s available for $19 on Amazon.
Records from the University of Pennsylvania show that Trump received a bachelor’s of science in economics in 1968 from the Wharton School of Finance and Commerce. The Daily Pennsylvanian campus newspaper dug out the commencement program showing that Trump graduated without honors, although during his business career he maintained publicly that he had graduated at the top of his class.
A copy of the program acquired from the Penn Archives lists 20 Wharton award and prize recipients, 15 cum laude recipients, four magna cum laude recipients and two summa cum laude recipients for the Class of 1968. Trump’s name appears nowhere on those lists.
John Maynard Keynes‘ general theory held that achieving full employment required government spending — in particular, investments in public works and hiring of the unemployed that would ebb and flow with economic conditions. It’s a standard concept in undergraduate economics courses.
The White House hasn’t sought to clarify Trump’s claim.
