Believe in America: Mitt Romney’s plan for jobs and economic growth, Romney for President, Inc. (2011).

Mitt Romney has referred to this book as the definitive expression of his economic plan in the Republican candidate debates, so we decided to do our due diligence by reading it. 

There are 59 recommendations in all, most of which would involve reversing policies of the current Administration.  The basic thrust is to slow the big government express and cut the private sector a little slack.  Some highlights follow:

TAXES (cut corporate tax rate from 35% to 25%, preserve Bush tax cuts, overhaul tax system longer term); REGULATORY (repeal Obamacare and Dodd-Frank, force regulators to consider costs of complying with new regulations, require Congressional approval of major regulations); TRADE (negotiate more trade agreements, and get tough with China); ENERGY (expedite development of untapped US oil and gas reserves, ban EPA regulation of carbon emissions); LABOR (reverse NLRB effort to favor union organization vs. impartially arbitrating labor/management disputes); HUMAN CAPITAL (rationalize federal training programs and block grant them to the states, encourage immigration of well educated people with valuable skills); FISCAL (cut spending and cap it at 20% of GDP, support a balanced budget amendment).

Most of these ideas seem sensible, but the difficulties involved are understated in many cases and there is little discussion of how to overcome predictable objections.  For example:

#Repealing Obama would take more than an executive order that support should be given to states that wanted to opt out, including offering an alternative program (none is satisfactorily described in the book) that would work better. 

#It is said the first step towards “getting the federal debt under control” will be “admitting we have a problem and refusing to allow any more irresponsible borrowing.”  In, other words, “just say no.”  Fine, but how would President Romney propose to get the members of Congress on board? 

The book might be more useful if it had been focused on a handful of issues instead of a “laundry list” of them.  Also, the absence of an identified author results in off putting statements like “Mitt Romney says” this and “Mitt Romney proposes” that, which detract from the book’s impact.

In sum, “Believe in America” marks Romney as a competent manager versus an inspirational leader. Maybe that’s OK, but it is not necessarily a recipe for electoral success.