Lewis: Caught in a political vise

We Coloradans are caught between a rock and a hard place financially. Colorado remains a great place to live, but unfortunately, we are getting hammered economically from both sides of the political spectrum.

Nationally, the policies and actions of the past 18 months have been a disaster for affordability. Tariffs have increased the cost of imported goods and invited retaliation against American exports. We started a war with Iran without first ensuring that global oil supplies could continue flowing reliably, and gasoline prices have soared. Inflation is again eating into wages, interest rates remain painfully high, and economic growth outside the extraordinary AI investment boom has been weak. Whatever the objectives of these policies, making life more affordable for ordinary Americans clearly hasn’t been the result.

At this point, Americans would have been better off if we had simply given Congress and the president an 18-month paid vacation. At least they wouldn’t have been able to make things worse. Poll after poll tells us what Americans actually want: make life more affordable.

Unfortunately, Washington isn’t the only jaw of the vise.

While we’ve been distracted by the national mess, Colorado has been creating one of its own. Our cost-of-living ranking has fallen from 34th to 47th, making Colorado one of the least affordable states in the country. We rank sixth among the most regulated states. Our business-competitiveness ranking has fallen 14 places to 25th. And recent episodes such as Colorado’s original, extraordinarily restrictive AI law — even though it was ultimately rewritten — sent exactly the wrong message to one of the fastest-growing industries in America: Think twice before locating here.

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Two things are important about those numbers. First, they can’t simply be blamed on Washington. These rankings compare Colorado with other states operating under the same federal government. Second, affordability, regulation, taxes and business competitiveness aren’t separate problems. They feed one another.

Here’s how the cycle works. We begin with another regulation — usually created with perfectly good intentions. But the regulation imposes new costs on a business, school, landlord or individual. Government then needs people and money to administer and enforce it, which means additional spending, fees or taxes. Businesses pass their higher costs along through higher prices, invest somewhere else or leave. Entrepreneurs considering Colorado look at the costs and regulatory environment and put Utah or another state higher on the list. Do that once and nobody notices. Do it hundreds of times and eventually you have a very expensive place to live.

That’s the problem with our current political debate. Nationally and locally, we are pursuing two very different economic philosophies that are producing an unfortunately similar result. Colorado is being squeezed like a tube of toothpaste, with Washington pushing from one end and the State Capitol from the other. Colorado families don’t particularly care which side of the vise is red and which is blue. They just want someone to stop tightening it.

The economic populism of the right and the economic progressivism of the left are different prescriptions with the same fundamental flaw: both are willing to subordinate economic growth and affordability to their political objectives.

The right’s emerging economic model isn’t traditional conservative economics. Tariffs, protectionism, restrictions on trade and immigration, enormous deficits and the economic consequences of the Iran war all tend to make things more expensive. The justification may be national security, American manufacturing, stronger borders or foreign policy, but eventually somebody gets the bill — and usually that somebody is the consumer.

Colorado’s progressive left gets to the same destination by an entirely different road: more government programs, regulations, mandates, fees, taxes and spending. Each individual policy has a constituency and usually a perfectly defensible objective. But stack enough of them together and you increase the cost of housing, energy, transportation, labor and government itself. Affordability becomes collateral damage.

We need a third way — not some mushy compromise halfway between the left and right, but a different economic objective altogether: Make things cheaper by making it easier to produce more of them.

Need cheaper housing? Build more of it. Need affordable energy? Produce more of it — natural gas, renewables, nuclear or whatever else can compete. Want better government? Demand measurable results before spending more money. Need additional tax revenue? Raise it transparently instead of disguising taxes as fees. On trade, favor open markets while protecting legitimate national-security interests. On regulation, regulate demonstrated harms rather than trying to eliminate every conceivable risk.

And on deficits, let’s finally acknowledge some arithmetic. Republicans can’t continually cut taxes without cutting spending, and Democrats can’t continually expand government benefits without somebody eventually paying for them.

The populist right says, protect us. The progressive left says, provide for us. Maybe it’s time for a third economic philosophy: Get out of the way and let us produce more. Colorado doesn’t need to choose which side of the political vise should squeeze harder. We need to get out of the vise.

Mark Lewis, a Colorado native, had a long career in technology, including serving as the CEO of several tech companies. He’s now retired and writes thriller novels. Mark and his wife, Lisa, and their two Australian Shepherds — Kismet and Cowboy, reside in Edwards.