Hey all,
Here’s our next edition of the Caucus Power Rankings. As a reminder, here’s where we are right now:
- T-3: Andrew Yang
- T-3: Pete Buttigieg
- T-5: Amy Klobuchar
- T-5: Tom Steyer
- 7: Joe Biden
- 8: Michael Bennett
- 9: Deval Patrick
- T-10: Tulsi Gabbard
- T-10: Mike Bloomberg
- 12: John Delaney
Arguments For:
Josh — #3 — Be still my heart. For those who don’t know, I am a massive fan of the idea of a universal basic income. I discovered the idea my junior year of college, then I created a self-study class at St. Olaf to study it further. I gave a TED-style talk on it at the St. Olaf version of TED talks where I guessed that UBI could play a major role in politics in the next few elections, and I pursued a masters in Social Policy and Planning at the London School of Economics to dive deeper into this idea. I wrote my master’s thesis on a theoretical transition–and the political feasibility–in the UK from universal credit to universal basic income, which I later submitted to a journal and to the Basic Income Earth Network (BIEN) call for submissions in 2016 (you can slog through it here). My thesis’s main conclusion was that if UBI is to become a mainstream idea, then a major party in the UK needs to include it in their policy manifesto.
Two years later, in walks Andrew Yang. I am friends with a lot of people in the basic income community thanks to my attendance at the BIEN 2014 Congress, so I quickly heard about Yang’s long-shot campaign in the latter half of 2018. Core to his candidacy is the belief that we need a universal basic income (he brands it a freedom dividend because it polls better, lol) in the USA to combat technological automation and to prepare for 21st century challenges in the labor market. I actually wrote a piece about how I see parallels between Yang’s support of UBI and some thoughts from Oscar Wilde. I was thrilled to see someone running on the UBI platform, but then things started to turn. He got on a Freakonomics podcast and he took any media opportunity he could get. I remember seeing him post on Facebook that he was thrilled to finally make the list of candidates in a 538 poll back when there were 25ish candidates in the race. For a guy with no political experience and a background in tech and entrepreneurship, he was just happy to be included in actual polls around December 2018.
But then, something else happened — he connected with a small but significant base of voters: often young and male, they saw what Yang proposed as a new look at politics and a significant change from traditional Democratic and Republican ideas. Yang’s slogans, “Not left, not right, forward” and “MATH: Make America Think Harder” allowed him to court some of those disaffected voters who hate the back and forth between the two parties and he gave people the ability to imagine a world where everyone has an income floor, among many other never-before-considered policies like treating data as a property right, telling the NCAA to pay athletes, and to encourage MMA fighters’ unionization. He’s so far outside the bounds of normal politics that it has almost a Bernie 2016 vibe to his campaign, and it’s paying off. He is a candidate of the internet, and at 45 years old, he’s also one of the few candidates that I think truly understands the internet. His endorsements are also an incredible list of people: Elon Musk, Dave Chappelle, Donald Glover, and Antonio Bryant, to name a few.
At the CNN debate a few months ago, they had an entire ten to fifteen minute debate over a universal basic income versus a universal jobs guarantee. Without Yang in this race, there is no way such a debate would have come up, and as a result, Tulsi Gabbard endorsed the idea, and Elizabeth Warren suggested she was open to it provided the data and research backs it up (which it does). Yang has done America a massive favor by getting UBI out there. Support is growing in the public, too. A recent poll found that 66% of college democrats support UBI and according to a Hill-HarrisX poll, support is about 50/50 now across the public, improving 6 points in UBI’s favor from February 2019 to September 2019.
Aside from his signature policy, it’s worth noting that he is the last major candidate of color left, and he is also the first major Asian-American to run for President since Hiram Fong in 1964 (although it’s worth noting that Tulsi Gabbard and Kamala Harris also have Pacific Islander and Asian heritage as well). His general affect also brings people into his corner — his jovial, quirky performances in debates and his acknowledgement that only crazy people dream of running for president normalize Yang and you get the sense that he’s just enjoying every minute of this race. In the run-up to the caucus, he is going on a 17-day, 4 stops-per-day, bus tour in Iowa to get his message out. For a guy who was just happy to be included in a poll in late 2018, it’s truly remarkable that he is now the 6th or 7th overall and that he has outlasted more traditional candidates like Jay Inslee and Kamala Harris.
Sam — #4 — So now that you’ve made it through Josh’s TED Talk deep dive on Andrew Yang’s Universal Basic Income policy of the Freedom Dividend, I guess you now see that you still have to read my thoughts on Andrew Yang. I’ll let you stretch and grab some coffee.
Back? Great! While I started my last piece noting that Mayor Pete was the dark horse candidate that emerge out of nowhere to become a serious contender, Andrew Yang may be on an even crazier ride national relevance. Beginning the race as a successful tech-CEO who just refused to wear a tie to any debate (or ever?), Yang was at very awkward at first, seeming to try and find his niche within the crowded primary field. His first calling card was to stick to the Freedom Dividend, the aforementioned UBI policy that promises a federally-guaranteed stipend to all Americans of $1000/month. At first blush this would seem like a crazy policy proposal to offer at this level. However, as Josh’s piece on Yang’s Freedom Dividend points out, the state of Alaska already has a UBI policy from oil revenue that grants $1200/year to every citizen of the state.
Yang then began to gain momentum through a base created strongly from young, college educated males with a strong internet presence. As Josh noted, his slogans of “Not left, not right, forward” and “MATH: Make America Think Harder” call for a new approach to politics and federal governance. This is both challenging Americans to take policy more seriously while simultaneously not taking ourselves so seriously. Wearing no tie on national television with a MATH lapel pin is a clear message that, frankly, resonates with a lot of Gen X and Millennial voters. Additionally, his policies are mostly progressive while also focusing on policies that rarely get air time in a national debate, such as paying college student athletes.
Yang has been more light-hearted than the rest of the field as well. He regularly lets any form of guard down, from admitting that he missed having his friend Cory Booker on the debate stage but predicted, rather joyfully, that Cory would be back! Maybe Yang knows something we don’t know. Yang is regularly cracking jokes in interviews and on the campaign trail. Yang’s policy positions and presence in this primary have been such a breath of fresh air and brought up a number of policies that never get the light of day nationally. We should all be grateful that Yang bet on himself when very few, including Josh and I initially, gave him much of a chance to get past the first debate. We’re better of with his success.
Arguments Against:
Josh — People don’t take him seriously. Because he’s on such a joyride through the campaign and he doesn’t pose much of a chance of actually winning, people aren’t really attacking him in debates and they aren’t threatened by him. This also shows itself in how the media has covered Yang’s campaign. The #YangMediaBlackout is real (and thoroughly documented by UBI legend Scott Santens on Twitter), as he spoke the least of any candidate on stage at every debate, and MSNBC frequently either omits him from graphics or in this case, genuinely shows a different Asian-American man’s photo instead of Yang’s photo. Now, I know this feels less like an argument against Yang than a plea for the media to cover him fairly, but I do count this as an argument against him. Nobody in establishment politics treats him as a serious candidate, and you have to wonder if the country feels the same way. Further, you do have to mention his dearth of political experience — he has never held elected office, which can be worrying, and he has zero foreign policy experience. And in this age where everyone is a pundit, few people fully believe that he can win the nomination, so they support other candidates instead. I’m guilty of that too — I put him third even though I think I agree with him on policy more than anyone else in the field. If we had ranked choice voting (another policy he supports) I’d be tempted to put him first.
Sam — In short, Yang is not being taken seriously outside of folks like Josh and I and his diehard supporters on Twitter. He hasn’t been seriously challenged since he is not expected to last much longer than New Hampshire, which leaves all serious voters from having a true test of Yang’s pros and cons. I do agree with Josh that the Yang Media Blackout is real and preventing his campaign from getting serious attention outside of debates. But on the other side of that coin, Yang also does not get attacked or forced to address the very tough policy and candidate profile questions. Yang’s resume just does not stand up to scrutiny for the office. Yang does not have experience in governing, let alone the public sector. Yang made it all the way to #4 for me because his campaign has been braking the mold, addressing difficult questions that society faces but regularly get looked over by Washington. And because I truly believe that more studies, research, and pilot programs for UBI need to begin to be given the time of day and considered as a truly viable option to address some of the greatest economic and fiscal challenges of our day.
Purple State Progressive 