By Matt Rooney
Americans are angry about high prices, Save Jerseyans, and they have every right to be.
Ever since the Biden Administration did what it did, consumers’ groceries cost more. Housing costs more. Electricity costs more. Insurance costs more. Families who thought they were firmly in the middle class are discovering that paychecks simply don’t stretch the way they did a few years ago.
Yet every election cycle, the same politicians who helped create this mess return with a familiar promise: Give us more power, and we’ll fix it.
Why would anyone believe them?
Government didn’t merely fail to prevent today’s affordability crisis. In many cases, government policies actively fueled it.
Inflation doesn’t materialize out of thin air. Washington spent trillions of dollars it didn’t have, pumped inordinate amounts of cash into the U.S. economy, and then acted surprised when the value of the dollar declined. Too many dollars chasing too few goods is Economics 101, not some mysterious phenomenon.
At the state level, New Jersey has piled on with some of the nation’s highest property taxes, endless fees, costly regulations, and energy policies that make electricity more expensive than it needs to be. Every new mandate imposed on businesses eventually shows up in the prices consumers pay.
Businesses don’t absorb those costs forever. They pass them along.
Then comes the second act.
The same politicians who made everything more expensive suddenly discover a passion for “price gouging.” They threaten investigations, propose price controls, subsidize favored industries, hand out rebate checks, or create new government programs to offset the very costs their own policies created.
But lately, the prescription has become even more radical. Increasingly, many Democrats aren’t merely proposing more regulation—they’re embracing ideas rooted in democratic socialism: government-run grocery stores, expanded public ownership, wealth redistribution, and a much larger role for the state in directing economic outcomes.
Think about the logic. If excessive government spending, intervention, and regulation helped fuel today’s affordability crisis, why would doubling down on those same ideas suddenly produce a different result?
It’s like trying to cure lung cancer with a steady diet of cigars.
History doesn’t inspire confidence. Countries that have moved further toward socialist economic models have often struggled with shortages, weaker incentives to invest and innovate, slower economic growth, and declining living standards compared with more market-oriented economies. Yet despite that record, many politicians continue to insist the solution to government-created problems is simply… more government.
It’s the political equivalent of breaking your neighbor’s window and then asking for applause because you offered to sell them the replacement glass.
History has repeatedly demonstrated that government efforts to control prices often make shortages worse. Artificial price caps discourage production. Subsidies distort markets. More bureaucracy creates more inefficiency. The cycle continues, requiring still more government intervention to solve the problems caused by the last round of intervention.
It’s a vicious circle that always ends the same way: less competition, fewer choices, and higher costs.
New Jersey offers a master class in this approach.
When electric bills climb, Trenton promises credits instead of confronting the policies driving energy costs higher. When housing becomes unaffordable, lawmakers add mandates while wondering why builders construct fewer homes. When insurance premiums increase, they search for someone to blame rather than examining the regulatory burden that contributes to those costs.
Government becomes both the arsonist and the firefighter.
None of this means markets are perfect. They aren’t. But competitive markets generally punish companies that overcharge or fail to satisfy customers. Government agencies face no such discipline. If a policy fails spectacularly, politicians usually respond by demanding bigger budgets, broader authority, and even more control.
That should concern every taxpayer.
The real solution isn’t another subsidy, another rebate, another commission, or another regulatory scheme. It’s creating conditions where businesses compete, investment grows, energy is abundant, housing can be built, and inflation is restrained through responsible fiscal policy.
In New Jersey, that means lower taxes, fewer unnecessary regulations, affordable and reliable energy, a serious commitment to fiscal restraint, and a government that understands its job is to create the conditions for prosperity—not to micromanage every aspect of the economy.
The next time a politician promises to solve the affordability crisis with another government program, ask one simple question:
If government helped create the problem, why should we expect government to solve it?
