Comparing and Contrasting the Two Major American Political Parties Essay Example

In the United States there exists largely a dichotomy with respect to parties of political affiliation, and while other parties can and do exist, most people refer to the US as it is now as a “two-party state.” The two parties, the Democratic Party and the Republican Party, have existed in our country for over one hundred fifty-three years each, and the struggle for power in which they both partake has been no small matter, becoming more and more hotly contested as time goes on. While both the Democratic Party and the Republican Party (GOP herein) seem starkly opposite at surface level, the two often have similar goals, aspirations and plans for our country, with the main point of contention being the methods by which such things are brought about. Fiscally, the Democrats and GOP both want a free economy with as little national debt as sustainably possible, but, for the most part, the Democrats favor government action, and the GOP favors private action. With respect to social policy, the Democrats favor more progressive legislation, and the GOP favors more traditional legislation.
As the US stands currently, in a recession, no American could disagree that everyone’s goal for the economy is to get out of the recession. The real question is “How do we do it?” Republicans say that we should cut spending, cut taxes and allow those cuts in taxes to promote job creation in the private sector: jobs come from businesses, and when the people who own the businesses have more money, they can hire more people to do more work, which would raise GDP and reduce the national debt. Democrats say that we should raise taxes to increase revenue, and use the increased revenue to sponsor various economic stimuli to promote greater productivity and job creation. This sort of top-down/bottom-up perspective has led many Americans to believe the motivations of the two parties to be a conflict of social classes, with Republicans representing largely the rich, and Democrats representing