To some left-leaning individuals, “deregulation” can be a scary word. It conjures up images of the Reagan era: slashing the federal budget, credit card companies running amok, and privatization of essential services. Democrats, too, embraced “ending the era of big government,” famously declared in Bill Clinton’s 1996 State of the Union address. Due to the long history of right-wing fearmongering and liberal complacency on the size and scope of federal power, deregulating any sector of the economy is often associated with empowering the rich and dissolving governmental power. On paper at least, those of us on the political left tend to favor a proactive government that takes care of those in need and reminds our fellow citizens we are all in the same boat, working together. The ideology now is a more complicated arrangement. What if many of the well-intentioned regulations and elements of “red tape” largely inhibits government programs to provide jobs, housing, clean energy, and the ever-so-elusive reliable public transportation? It seems evident to many that we are living in the ultimate irony, in which government has over-regulated itself and its ability to build, develop, centralize, and provide great works that have defined the left and the Democratic Party in the past. 

The 1970s brought a wave of completely justified movements for environmental conservation and consumer justice. Even more impactfully, the left took its first steps towards accepting the right’s narrative of powerful government being an enemy. Backlash against the New Deal Coalition’s growth-heavy mindset caused a surge in federal, state, and municipal regulations to implement stringent environmental reviews and enforce accessibility standards, which opened up the government to new heights of legal liability, and enabled mass lawsuits to abuse the system. This bureaucratic stand-still has caused a lingering stagnance that is finally addressed head on by Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson in Abundance. The book sparked controversy on the political left, receiving mixed reviews. Klein and Thompson advocate for a society of widely available, inexpensive, and environmentally sustainable essential services. They warn of the “scarcity mentality;” which accelerates the fear of growth and disillusionment with deregulation ahead of the ability to effectively implement programs of social uplift. 

Klein and Thompson identify that older generations on the left found government to be an untrustworthy agent of social change, even before the extent of the climate crisis was made evident, there was a push to turn the clock back on growth and development as a means of environmental protection. This led to many self-hindering government regulations that make the kind of change proposed by a Green New Deal virtually impossible. Rather than an abundance of green energy on a centralized grid, the scarcity mentality would prefer a status quo of minimizing consumption and avoiding development at all costs. This well-intentioned, individual-centered mindset on environmentalism is, at best, a band-aid for a gushing wound that is the crises of climate change and mass pollution. What we as Democrats should be able to agree on is that government needs to allow itself to build, grow, and preserve our clean air and water through new green technology and new infrastructure, rather than suburban sprawl that preserves the idea of a sort of left-wing individualism. 

Like Klein and Thompson, I’m a believer in the potential for government to do extraordinary things. The book’s introduction describes a near-utopian society with plentiful affordable housing, affordable green energy, AI used for good, equitable labor rights, and economic equality. Not all of these ideas may seem pragmatic, but they are possible. While Reagan and Clinton’s neoliberalism saw government as a problem that hinders personal freedom or social justice,  the “Abundance Bros” take an approach that puts faith in the power of collective change. Klein and Thompson propose the near-paradoxical reality that when people lose their faith in government, their government loses its faith in itself to be a powerful agent of progress– especially in blue states where costs are soaring and people are fleeing. Some of the excesses of past liberalism have created fear around centralization and efficiency when it comes to building great public works, even those aligned with progressive goals– whether that’s constructing government-owned grocery stores in Manhattan, providing rural broadband access to far-flung corners of the nation, or transitioning our national grid from fossil fuel reliance to clean and plentiful renewable energy. California has been planning for a High Speed Rail network between San Francisco and Los Angeles since 1979, and yet there is absolutely no end in sight as of 2026. Faulty eminent domain laws, environmental reviews, conflicted special interests, and general mismanagement have prevented this project from becoming a reality. Most Democrats should no doubt be able to agree that such works would be a proud accomplishment for one of the most liberal states in the country, but instead it’s completely stuck. The Abundance Agenda, when looked at with an open mind, is actually about replicating the strength of 20th Century Democratic reforms like the Works Progress Administration, the Job Corps, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, and more. These accomplishments and countless others from the New Deal to the Great Society are cornerstones of the left-of-center legacy that are rightfully lauded by most, and they would be largely impossible in the current legalistic and bureaucratic climate, as evidenced by California’s high-speed rail predicament. 

A common misconception is that Abundance is hostile to progressive economics due to this emphasis on deregulating development. Progressive critics interpret Abundance as relying heavily on the private sector, putting undue faith in market capitalism to build a more equitable future. But in reality, Klein and Thompson are critical of modern consumer capitalism. Abundance advocates for a repeal of regulations that stymie housing, energy affordability, and the growth of green development, but a closer look will show that this is not an argument for en masse laissez-faire economics. In fact, they criticize what they describe as “an uncanny economy” in which consumer products like flatscreen televisions have become an affordable achievement for the average American middle-class household, but owning a home or sending their children to college debt-free seem out of reach. In many ways, the type of society of abundant growth that the authors desire is a New Deal for the 21st Century, and one that can actually be accomplished rather than hindered. Klein and Thompson write, “We worry over climate change and health inequality. We want more affordable housing and higher median wages. We want children to breathe cleaner air and commuters to move easily on mass transit systems.”  In order to bring housing costs down for Americans, they assert that there must be a rapid increase in supply. While some may not favor the right-coded optics of the “supply-side” approach, the train of thought is not unprecedented in the annals of American progressivism. How did Franklin Roosevelt promote rural electrification that changed millions of lives in the Tennessee River Valley and beyond? Build, build, build. The burdens of environmental review processes, largely centered in blue states, make it extremely slow and difficult to build almost anything, including public housing, energy, and transit. Deregulating the development of all three is essential to tackle the affordability crisis that many of our most visionary leaders in the party identify as the primary issue facing millions of Americans. 

The authors’ emphasis is not centered on increased taxes for billionaires or breaking up of big corporations as seen in Bernie Sanders or Zohran Mamdani’s socialist ideologies, but that doesn’t mean their agendas are incompatible. Despite self-identifying as a Democratic Socialist, the newly minted Mayor of New York City himself has proven to be quite the advocate for the Abundance Agenda. Mayor Mamdani provides perfect examples of the how in Klein and Thompson’s equation. Shortly after being inaugurated, a series of executive orders were unveiled with a special emphasis on streamlining housing. The Mayor’s orders include establishing a Land Inventory Task Force to rapidly identify sites to develop new housing, bypassing existing red tape. Even his inaugural address nodded towards the vision laid out by Klein and Thompson: “City Hall will deliver an agenda of safety, affordability, and abundance—where government looks and lives like the people it represents.”

In order for government to be an effective vessel of social change, it is essential that it be allowed to deliver, rather than be stalled by easily-abused legislation that overly-democratizes development through burdensome reviews. Abundance is about redistribution and effective government as much as it is about streamlining and deregulating. For every promise of affordability, let us be realistic about what that means; progressives must be able to deliver on their vision through pragmatism without forgetting the principles upon which we stand. For every ambitious social program we stand for, let’s take a look at how the government will be able to play a role in its implementation, rather than bog it down in impossible red tape. This means changing both our legislative approach and how the Democratic Party talks about government. The time of bending the knee to the vested interests of aging homeowners stuck in a New Left mindset is over. The party has to emphasize the role of government in affordability, a lesson laid out by Klein and Thompson and proven in action by Mamdani, even while his campaign incorporated elements of socialism and left-wing populism. The government has extraordinary potential to be an agent of good, so to place limitations on its ability to act is counterintuitive in the age of the affordability crisis. The Abundance Agenda and a meaningful economic populism can work in tandem, to make sure we live in a nation of economic stability among the working class with access to a broad range of robust social services, cheap energy, and stronger communities. 

Works Cited

Garcia, Deanna. “Mamdani Signs Executive Orders Aimed at Addressing Housing in NYC.” January 1, 2026. https://ny1.com/nyc/all-boroughs/news/2026/01/01/mamdani-signs-executive-orders-aimed-at-addressing-housing-in-nyc.

Klein, Ezra and Derek Thompson. “Abundance”.  Avid Reader Press, 2025.

“President Clinton’s 1996 State of the Union Address as Delivered.” https://clintonwhitehouse4.archives.gov/WH/New/other/sotu.html. 

The Official Website of the City of New York. “Mayor Zohran Mamdani Inaugural Address.” January 1, 2026. https://www.nyc.gov/mayors-office/news/2026/01/mayor-zohran-mamdani-inaugural-address.