The end of the ‘winners and losers’ economy is good for America

My latest op-ed at the Washington Examiner.

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Check out my latest piece at the Washington Examiner. Have a great weekend!

Solar stocks plunged on Tuesday after the Senate released its version of what President Donald Trump has called the “big, beautiful bill.” While some anti-growth carveouts remain, one of its strongest reforms is how it begins to unwind former President Joe Biden’s green energy subsidies. This shift marks a long-overdue correction, ending an era where Washington picks winners and losers in the energy economy.

The market’s reaction was revealing. Overinflated by years of preferential treatment, many renewable companies are now adjusting to reality — one where their products compete on merit, not mandates. That’s a good thing.

Under President Biden, energy policy was driven by top-down planning and heavy-handed regulation. The results? Higher prices, constrained supply, and a fragile grid. But under Trump, we’re seeing a reorientation: more energy abundance and a return to commonsense competition.

We don’t need Washington trying to engineer our energy future—we need it to get out of the way. Stripping tax favoritism, streamlining environmental permitting, and unleashing domestic production will lower prices and improve reliability. People in markets—not bureaucrats—should decide where capital flows.

This fact extends beyond energy. The Trump administration has wisely begun dismantling financial regulations that have weaponized government against innovation and consumer choice. One key win: the executive order halting any advance on a Federal Reserve–issued central bank digital currency (CBDC), which would have been a surveillance tool masquerading as modernization.

In another victory for freedom and innovation, the SEC dropped its lawsuit against Binance, signaling the end of an era in which crypto was treated more like a threat than a technology. The Biden administration’s hostility toward decentralized finance stifled innovation. Trump is helping reverse that trend, encouraging financial innovation and clarity.

Then there’s the CFPB’s dropped case against Zelle—a legally flimsy attempt to hold banks liable for fraud committed by third parties. Peer-to-peer payments aren’t inherently risky; bad actors are. The right approach is strengthening consumer education and fraud prevention, not punishing tech-enabled payment tools.

The Biden DOJ’s lawsuit against Visa’s debit card business was another case of political antitrust, targeting a company not for consumer harm but for being too successful. The “sin”? It has a 60% market share in a highly competitive industry, with no hint of predatory behavior and no shortage of payment choices for consumers and businesses. Thankfully, a shift is underway. Assistant Attorney General Gail Slater has emphasized a return to data-driven enforcement and sound economic reasoning in antitrust. That's a necessary course correction from the ideologically driven activism of recent years.

Still, regulatory bloat remains. Trump should go further by reversing the Biden-era expansion of the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA), which pressures banks to prioritize geography and politics over creditworthiness. That’s distortion, not inclusion. When credit is misallocated for political goals, financial stability and the people it's supposed to help suffer.

Energy permitting is another frontier. Under current laws like NEPA, critical infrastructure is delayed for years. We must accelerate approvals for pipelines, LNG terminals, and power plants if we want a resilient energy grid and lower prices. Energy abundance should not be held hostage to outdated processes and red tape.

What ties all this together is a single, clear principle: Government should not control economic outcomes—it should set the rules of the game, then get out of the way. America doesn’t need a new round of industrial policy or neo-populist planning. We need a recommitment to classical liberalism, grounded in free-market economics, limited government, and individual freedom.

Industrial policy, whether from the left or right, assumes Washington knows better than markets. It doesn’t. The history of failed subsidies, protectionist trade wars, and crony corporatism proves it. If we want more innovation, investment, and opportunity, the best policy is humility: let people prosper.

That starts by ending the “winners and losers” economy. No more special favors, mandates, or market manipulation. Just a level playing field where success is earned, not granted.

Vance Ginn, Ph.D., is president of Ginn Economic Consulting, host of the Let People Prosper Show, and former chief economist of the first Trump White House's OMB, 2019-20. Follow him on X.com at @VanceGinn.