From the numbers alone, intense public antipathy for Donald Trump’s economic record makes no sense. Our economy has not crashed.
Unemployment, which measured 4.2% in September, remains well below the 21st century average. Inflation, 3.4% year-over-year in August, exceeds the 25-year average by less than one percentage point. Overall growth, currently projected at 2.3% this year by the Federal Reserve, tracks the economy’s long-term potential.
That scoreboard cannot explain why only 26% of Americans approved of Trump’s economic performance in an Associated Press/NORC poll last week – a number that has Republicans fearing a midterm elections catastrophe.
What can explain it: Two years after campaigning on a promise of rapid improvements, Americans see that his policies have made things worse. And if that weren’t bad enough, the billionaire president openly scorns their struggles with affordability as “a hoax.”