Psychologist says Gramm was right about whiners

ABC News:

This week, former Sen. Phil Gramm, R-Texas, economic adviser to Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., gave an interesting persepective on the nation's economic concerns by calling the U.S. a "nation of whiners."

While the comment ruffled feathers across the nation and prompted swift condemnation from presumptive presidential candidates Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., and McCain, according to consumer psychologist Kit Yarrow, Gramm was on to something.

"I think the way consumers feel about things is very emotional," Yarrow told "Good Morning America" today. "Those emotions are trumping reality, creating a snowball, which makes the economy worse. It's not as bad as consumers feel like it is."

Yarrow, who is also the Russell T. Sharpe Professor of Business at Golden Gate University, says that lack of consumer confidence has been caused by an negative overreaction to recent economic trends.

"We've had great prosperity for the last few years," Yarrow said. "We had very cheap gas. We've had a lot of increase in our home values. We've had it really pretty good as the stock market increases. Emotion is always caused by this mismatch between what we perceive and reality. It's really emotion, the psychology, that's contributing to our economy right now in a negative way."

According to Yarrow, consumers are more focused on problems on a larger scale, such as troubles in the housing markets. and the relative weakness of the dollar, because they have to deal with specific problems on a daily basis, such as rising gas and food prices. When consumers shell out more than $4 per gallon at the gas station, other economic considerations seem closely related and "very real."

In addition, Yarrow said consumers tend to feel threatened when growth is not extraordinary -- an unhealthy and unrealistic expectation.

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Not surprising Democrats play on these fears when there is a Republican in the White House. It explains why Sen. Schumer would cause a run on a bank to make things look worse. It explains how Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama could start the Bush years essentially insolvent and wind up as multi millionaires complaining about the economy.

It does not explain why John McCain would act so weird about Gramm's straight talk.