Errrr the current Donald J Trump administration has not managed to create the jobs nor growth the previous administration has, and the resultant deficits are massive. As for the VP-Elect, Kamala Harris is half Jamaican, maybe a bit of Rastafari Culture could soothe your sore loser mentality
Once again, a Democratic Administration must clean up the mess of a GOP one, as Regan, Bush and now Donald J Trump have decimated the finances of the United States.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/chuckj...-election-economic-scorecard/?sh=504c556441af
Trump’s Re-Election Economic Scorecard
Chuck JonesSenior Contributor
Markets
I cover technology companies, worldwide economies and the stock market
U.S. President Donald Trump (Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images)
GETTY IMAGES
The elections are five days away and the first estimate for September quarter’s
GDP was released Thursday morning, showing growth of 33.1%. While this is just short of twice the 16.7% record growth recorded in the first quarter of 1950, it is due to the rebound from the June quarter’s record fall of 31.4% and the March quarter’s decline of 5.0%.
The five charts below show how the economy has performed during President Trump’s time in office. As can be seen in many of them the economy was trending with positive results from President Obama’s term until the coronavirus hit.
Besides inheriting an economy that was doing well under President Obama, a key question for President Trump is could have some of the damage to the economy been avoided if there had been a more robust response to the coronavirus.
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GDP growth is a record but still negative from last year
The U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis reported that the economy grew 33.1% in the September quarter. Due to the
distortions created by the way the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis or BEA calculates GDP; a better way to look at the economy is the year over year growth rate. As can be seen in the chart below from Gregory Daco at Oxford Economics the economy is down 2.9% year over year and is forecast to still be in negative territory in the December quarter at down 2.4%.
U.S. GDP growth
GREGORY DACO AT OXFORD ECONOMICS
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Trump continually says that the economy is the best ever during his Presidency. However, even before Covid-19 hit the economy the chart below goes back to 1930 and shows that this is far from the truth. Trump’s best GDP growth year was 3.0% in 2018 and prior to him there had been 48 years with higher growth rates.
U.S. GDP growth
U.S. BUREAU OF ECONOMIC ANALYSIS
Job growth has lagged Obama’s and 12 previous Presidents
Trump’s best year adding jobs before Covid-19 was 2018 when 2.3 million more people were working at the end of the year. However, this was less than any of President Obama’s last three years and Trump’s three year total is less than Obama’s last three years. Another indication that Trump has not had the best economy ever.
Job creation under Presidents Obama and Trump
U.S. BUREAU OF LABOR STATISTICS AND @DEMDIFFERENCE
And when compared to 12 previous Presidents, Trump is the only one to have lost jobs.
Job growth under 13 Presidents
U.S. BUREAU OF LABOR STATISTICS AND @CAPACTION
Unemployment rate
The unemployment rate was 7.8% when Obama took office during the teeth of the Great Recession and peaked at 10.0% in October 2009, nine months later. It continued to decline at a steady pace through 2018, Trump’s second year in office, when it flat-lined. Which is not surprising as there will always be some level of unemployment.
Bear in mind that when Trump touts the rebound in jobs and unemployment he wants voters to focus on the decline from the record 14.7% unemployment rate, not the increase from 3.5%. And keep in mind that there were millions of people undercounted in the surveys. The Bureau of Labor Statistics estimates that the unemployment rate actually hit 19.5% in April.
Unemployment rate
U.S. BUREAU OF LABOR STATISTICS AND JACK WOIDA
S&P 500
The one metric that has done well under Trump is the stock market. From his election and inauguration dates the S&P 500 has increased by 53% and 47%, respectively. A large part of the gains occurred in 2017 when the Index rose 19% in anticipation of the corporate tax rate being cut from 35% to 21%.
As shown in the chart below Obama had gains of 41% and 85% four years post his election and inauguration, respectively. While Trump benefited from the tax cuts, Obama benefited from the markets decline due to the Great Recession.
S&P 500 weekly price chart
STOCKCHARTS.COM
A key question is, was it the best policy to cut tax rates in 2018 when the economy was doing well, especially since they disproportionately benefited corporations and high-income individuals. The cuts helped the stock market by increasing companies profits (chart below from FactSet on S&P 500 earnings), but it probably would have been better to have “saved” that money in the anticipation that the economy would at least hit a soft patch. The coronavirus stimulus payments would then not have as much of a negative hit to the Federal deficit.
S&P 500 earnings
FACTSET, JOHN BUTTERS
Federal deficit
The Federal deficit was trending up under Trump’s Presidency and then exploded with the stimulus payments due to Covid-19 and lower tax revenue due to the downturn in the economy. Going into 2020 the deficit was projected to be above $1 trillion and wound up hitting $3.1 trillion.
Federal deficit pre and post-pandemic
PETER G PETERSON FOUNDATION
As a percentage of GPD the deficit was the largest since World War II. And the pre-pandemic deficit would have been larger than Obama’s post-Great Recession deficits.
Federal deficit as a percent of GDP
PETER G PETERSON FOUNDATION