Kentucky Highlights Elements of “Pocketbook Politics”

Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear speaks to an audience during Inauguration Day, marking the beginning of his second term in office, Dec. 12, 2023. | Photo by Dale Greer/U.S. Air National Guard via Wikimedia Commons

Part V of the “Pocketbook Politics” Series

In Part I of this series, this column talked about “Pocketbook Politics.” This Filipino journalist reworded it from “a 2008 study of voters in Sweden during the 1990s that found significant evidence for self-interested pocketbook voting. The (study) authors found that voters can and will respond to direct promises of personal economic benefits.”

Last November 21, 2024, Gov. Andy Beshear of the Commonwealth of Kentucky provided an update on economic development and funding to help communities recover from floods and tornadoes. Also announced were the Violence Against Women Act grant funding, the Kentucky State Police’s annual food drive, and medical cannabis highlights. The governor also updated the upcoming weather and named snow crews preparing the roads as this week’s Team Kentucky All-Stars.

Governor Beshear announced the largest economic development project in Shelby County’s history and the most significant jobs announcement in the commonwealth in over two years. He was joined by local leaders and executives from Shelbyville Battery Manufacturing, a subsidiary of e-Storage, in sharing the good news with the media and the public. The nearly $712 million project, which will create 1,572 skilled, high-tech jobs, represents the third-largest project for job creation and the fourth-largest investment during the administration.

Governor Beshear highlighted continued investment in the commonwealth’s soaring economy as he joined local officials in Madison County to cut the ribbon on the state’s latest site development project, attracting even more jobs to the Richmond area.

He announced likewise that $29.6 million will help three communities recover from the tornado and flooding disasters of 2021 and 2022. The funding will come from Kentucky’s Disaster Recovery Program, which this column thinks is anchored on back-to-basic needs.

After further research, this column finds that the Commonwealth of Kentucky achieved three consecutive fiscal years of record-setting budget surpluses. The revenue estimates for the 2024-2026 biennium continue that momentum. The Consensus Revenue Forecasting Group’s new official estimate calls for $1.4 billion more in General Fund revenues than budgeted in the current year. More details of good news from the Bluegrass State will be provided in the comment section of this instant column article.

The elements of “Pocketbook Politics” are stable worker incomes, affordable commodity prices, and available resources for safety nets, in addition to efficient and stable governance, law, and order.

Part II of the “Pocketbook Politics” Series discussed establishing a funding mechanism for Pocketbook Politics. Chapters of it can be organized as cooperatives (co-ops) in every state that can engage in food and commodity production, augmenting supplies and making goods more affordable. It is due to the economic law of supply and demand.

This column is optimistic that the Commonwealth of Kentucky may spearhead the so-called “Old Man River (OMR) Renaissance,” as discussed in Part IV. It said: “Perhaps Gov. Andy Beshear of Kentucky should contact his fellow governors of the 31 other states connected to the OMR, as they have tributary rivers providing water. Some of the states are also part of the OMR deltas. Perhaps the 32 states can form a joint consortium—with or without the blessing and participation of the federal government and its agencies.

“Why Governor Beshear? The Kentuckian governor laid out a framework in an op-ed published in The New York Times on November 12 about the need to focus on core issues that matter to people every day—like jobs, housing and healthcare.”

Part IV said that to put it in another perspective, it was Governor Beshear’s equivalent of a socioeconomic “call to arms. “