The Misguided Gospel of Abundance: How Democrats Risk Losing the Economic Narrative
By A. Piratemonk
In April 2025, a viral moment on Jon Stewart’s podcast captured the zeitgeist of a growing movement within liberal circles. Ezra Klein, co-author of the book Abundance, described the maddening bureaucratic hurdles blocking the deployment of rural broadband funding under President Joe Biden’s bipartisan infrastructure bill. The process, Klein argued, was emblematic of a broader problem: progressive overregulation stifling progress and creating scarcity in America. The clip spread like wildfire, amplified by Fox News, Elon Musk, and thousands of retweets, resonating as a modern parable of government inefficiency. Stewart groaned audibly; the audience felt the weight of the anecdote. It was a story Ronald Reagan might have told in the 1980s, updated for the digital age.
But there was a problem: the story wasn’t true—or at least, not in the way Klein framed it. The cumbersome broadband application process wasn’t the result of progressive “everything bagel liberalism,” as Klein and his co-author Derek Thompson argue in Abundance. Instead, it stemmed from Republican senators and their telecom industry donors, who insisted on a Byzantine process to protect regional monopolies and block affordable broadband access. This wasn’t a tale of lefty bureaucrats run amok; it was a case study in corporate power undermining public policy.
This disconnect lies at the heart of the Abundance movement, a burgeoning intellectual project that has captivated Democratic elites but risks steering the party into a political and electoral quagmire. By focusing on deregulation and bureaucratic reform as the path to prosperity, Abundance sidesteps the more uncomfortable truth: corporate monopolies and oligarchic influence are the primary drivers of scarcity in America today. In doing so, it provides rhetorical cover for the very forces Democrats should be confronting—especially in the age of Donald Trump’s second presidency and Elon Musk’s deregulatory crusade.
The Abundance Agenda: A New Liberal Orthodoxy?
The Abundance thesis, as articulated by Klein and Thompson, posits that America’s failure to address pressing challenges—housing shortages, slow clean energy adoption, inadequate infrastructure—stems from excessive regulation and progressive obsession with process over outcomes. The book has struck a chord among centrist Democrats, think tanks like Third Way, and media outlets eager for a narrative that avoids the messiness of class conflict. Its appeal lies in its simplicity: streamline government, cut red tape, and unleash a tide of prosperity.
Klein’s broadband anecdote, for instance, paints a vivid picture. He described a process so convoluted that, years after the infrastructure bill’s passage, barely any applicants had completed their applications. The implication was clear: progressive policies, with their endless checklists and environmental reviews, were choking progress. But as David Sirota and Aaron Regunberg pointed out in a scathing critique published by The Lever on April 4, 2025, the real culprits were Republican lawmakers and telecom giants who designed the process to protect their interests, not to serve the public.
This misdiagnosis is emblematic of Abundance’s broader flaw: it downplays or ignores the role of corporate power in creating scarcity. Take the clean energy transition. Klein and Thompson attribute delays in renewable energy projects to environmental regulations like the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). Yet, as green energy developers have long noted, the fossil fuel industry’s influence—through utility monopolies and disinformation campaigns—poses a far greater obstacle. Oil and gas front groups spread falsehoods about wind turbines and solar panels, while gas-dominated utilities make it nearly impossible for renewables to connect to the grid. Deregulating NEPA might streamline some processes, but it won’t address the entrenched power of fossil fuel cartels.
Similarly, Abundance fixates on zoning laws as the primary driver of the housing crisis, echoing a well-worn critique of NIMBYism. But a 2022 Johns Hopkins study found that corporate consolidation in the home-building industry has led to deliberately reduced housing supply, as dominant firms prioritize profits over volume. Wall Street’s role in buying up housing stock and algorithmic rent-fixing further exacerbates affordability issues. These systemic, corporate-driven factors are conspicuously absent from the Abundance narrative, which prefers to blame local bureaucrats and environmentalists.
The Corporate Blind Spot
The omission of corporate power from Abundance’s analysis is not accidental. As Sirota and Regunberg argue, the movement’s rhetoric aligns uncomfortably with the deregulatory agenda of Trump’s second administration and Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). Musk himself seized on Klein’s broadband clip, tweeting, “This shows why regulatory overhaul is necessary.” The irony is stark: Musk, who admitted to proposing his Hyperloop concept to derail California’s high-speed rail project, is among the oligarchs Abundance fails to confront. His DOGE initiative, which promises to slash government programs and regulations, has been framed as a quest for efficiency—a MAGA version of the Abundance gospel.
On X, the platform Musk owns, reactions to Abundance and its critique reveal a polarized landscape. Some users, like @ProgressiveVoice, echoed The Lever’s takedown, writing, “Klein’s book is a neoliberal trojan horse, blaming progressives for corporate greed’s failures. Democrats need to call out oligarchs, not red tape.” Others, like @CentristThinker, defended Klein, arguing, “Regulation is a problem. Look at California’s housing costs. We can’t ignore bureaucracy just because corporations are bad too.” The debate underscores a broader tension within the Democratic Party: should it embrace economic populism or double down on technocratic solutions?
A web search reveals additional context. A 2023 Federal Reserve study found that income inequality, not zoning restrictions, is a primary driver of rising housing prices. Meanwhile, a 2024 report by the Center for American Progress highlighted how corporate consolidation across industries—from baby formula to pharmaceuticals—creates artificial scarcity to maximize profits. These findings challenge Abundance’s central premise, suggesting that deregulation alone won’t solve America’s problems. Yet, the book’s narrative has found fertile ground among elites wary of the party’s growing populist wing, led by figures like Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
The Populist Alternative
Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez’s “Fighting Oligarchy Tour” has gained traction by framing corporate power as the root of America’s economic woes. Their message resonates with a public frustrated by decades of wage stagnation and wealth concentration. As Sirota notes, “In a world where $79 trillion was taken from the bottom 90 percent of households over the last few decades, the central problem isn’t a lack of ‘abundance.’ The problem is that abundance is being hoarded by the rich.”
This populist approach has shown electoral promise. In Wisconsin’s 2025 state Supreme Court race, Democrats centered an anti-oligarch message and defeated a Musk-backed candidate despite his millions in campaign spending. The victory suggests that voters respond to a clear narrative pitting working people against corporate elites—a narrative Abundance avoids in favor of a less confrontational focus on process.
Critics of Abundance argue that this avoidance is strategic. Matt Bennett of Third Way, a centrist think tank with ties to corporate donors, has dismissed economic populism as a “purity test.” On X, users like @LeftyOrganizer have called out such groups: “Third Way and Klein are bankrolled by the same billionaires they refuse to criticize. It’s no wonder they push deregulation over accountability.” The financial ties are well-documented: The Lever has reported on the Abundance movement’s connections to Big Tech, crypto, and fossil fuel interests, raising questions about its neutrality.
The Electoral Stakes
The Abundance agenda’s rise comes at a precarious moment for Democrats. In 2024, Kamala Harris embraced a version of its rhetoric, emphasizing deregulation and innovation over populist critiques of corporate power. The strategy failed to resonate with voters, who trusted Trump more on economic issues, according to exit polls analyzed by The Washington Post. As Trump’s second term unfolds, with its promises of tax cuts for the wealthy and environmental deregulation, Democrats face a choice: double down on Abundance’s technocratic vision or embrace a populist rebrand that directly confronts corporate monopolies.
The risks of the former are evident. By echoing Trump and Musk’s rhetoric about government inefficiency, Democrats risk ceding the economic narrative to the right. As @RealistVoter noted on X, “If Dems keep blaming ‘red tape’ instead of billionaires, they’re handing Trump a playbook to gut social programs while claiming he’s ‘fixing’ things.” Meanwhile, the party’s populist wing argues for a bolder approach. Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) has called for policies that address “the concentration of wealth and power,” while Rep. Chris Deluzio (D-Pa.) has pushed for stronger antitrust enforcement.
A Path Forward
The critique of Abundance is not a rejection of its call for efficiency. As urban planner Louis M. commented in The Lever’s discussion section, “Over-regulation often exists and has deleterious consequences. But fighting the oligarchy should be the top priority.” The challenge for Democrats is to balance these priorities: streamline government where necessary, but without absolving corporations of their role in creating scarcity.
This balance requires a narrative shift. Instead of framing bureaucracy as the primary villain, Democrats must highlight how corporate power distorts markets and undermines public policy. The broadband debacle, for instance, could be a case study in how telecom monopolies manipulate government processes to protect profits. The housing crisis could spotlight Wall Street’s role in driving up rents. By centering these stories, Democrats can offer a clear contrast to Trump’s oligarch-friendly agenda.
The Abundance movement, for all its intellectual appeal, risks leading Democrats down a familiar path of triangulation and capitulation. As The Lever’s Kelley wrote, “This is why the Democratic Party has worse polling numbers than Trump, Musk, and MAGA.” To win back voters, Democrats must reject the temptation to scapegoat regulation and instead name the real culprits: the corporations and billionaires hoarding America’s abundance. Only then can they craft a narrative that resonates with a public hungry for change—and avoid handing the economic story to the very forces they seek to defeat.
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