Trickle-down economics (or it's more euphemistic name, supply-side economics) didn't work in Hoover's time either, though he swore by it.

You'da think we learned then, but by the time Reagan was around, the GOP base was more worried about uppity abortionist women and communist plots to turn the kids gay than whether the economy could support the promise of infinite growth. The boomers voting at the time were disinterested in future generations.

Heck, Reagan, himself was a Revelation Futurist, and believef he would be instrumental in a nuclear exchange to serve as a biblical apocalypse. He just couldn't drive himself to first strike (and the Soviets weren't going to do it.)