The US Economy: Obama and Trump and Biden
The US Economy: Obama and Trump
Trump has one apparently legitimate claim to success, and that is the US economy. But, that claim is exaggerated, and was accomplished by irresponsible approaches.
Trump Economic Policies – Obama vs Trump
Trump Inherited a Good Economy
Trump, falsely, states:
“As you know, our administration inherited many problems across government and across the economy,” he told the assembled reporters. “To be honest, I inherited a mess. It’s a mess. At home and abroad, a mess.”
The economic data, however, paints a different picture:
“President Trump inherited an economy in January 2017 that was already at a record level on many key measures, such as the number of persons with jobs, real median household income, household net worth, and stock market level. It also featured a low unemployment rate of 4.7%, very low inflation, and a moderate budget deficit.”
See Overview 2017- 2019 – Scorecard Trump vs Obama
Economic Policy of Donals Trump Administration
By Farcaster – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0
Next, consider the irresponsible, short-sighted economic policies the Trump administration has implemented.
Trump’s Irresponsible Approaches to the US Economy
Trump’s formal education includes a degree from Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, and he has had numerous business endeavors. So, the economy is one area in which Trump’s bombastic claim to economic expertise has some validity. In other words, Trump likely understands economic dynamics.
Low Prime Interest Rates to Stimulate the Economy
Lowering the prime interest is a fiscal policy approach known to stimulate the economy, however it leads to inflation.
The utilization of fiscal policy is fraught with controversy. A lower prime rate makes borrowing money less expensive. However, a near-zero prime interest rate leaves no capacity to stimulate the economy if it is subsequently needed. Such a need arose with the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the Trump administration’s short-term irresponsible setting of low interest rates meant that the fiscal approach would not be as useful for addressing COVID economic needs.
Another more harmful effect is that extended low rates lead to inflation. Inflation that occurred during the Biden administration had to be addressed by the Federal Reserve’s monetary policy of setting interest rates high.
Trump knows the dynamics of monetary policy and inflation.
“On Sept. 12, 2016, during an interview on CNBC, Republican nominee Donald Trump accused Yellen of keeping interest rates low to boost the stock market and burnish President Obama’s legacy. Then she would raise rates and the market would collapse, he predicted. “She’s keeping them artificially low to get Obama retired,” he said. “Watch what is going to happen afterwards. It is a very serious problem … and to a certain extent, I think she should be ashamed of herself.”
Politico – Trump, Yellen, and Federal Reserve
Of course, shameless Trump was not ashamed. Instead, he blamed inflation on the Biden administration.
Tax Cuts to Corporations
The US debt is large. During good economic times, the responsible political policy would be to pay off debt, not increase it.
Trump gave tax breaks to corporations. Any sector of an economy that receives tax breaks will have more money to spend. The tax cuts to corporations gave them money to spend, at the expense of a larger US budget deficit. Many corporations used the tax cut money to buy back their publicly held stock. Buying back their stocks drove their stock prices higher, without having further developed their corporations.
Deficit Spending
The Trump budget, before COVID-19 economic impacts, had large deficit spending (See above, Economic Scorecard: Trump vs Obama, 3. Federal Budget deficit).
Deficit spending is analogous to running up your credit cards. Using deficit spending the government receives benefits today, and postpones paying for them indefinitely. This is a tempting approach for any government, but highly irresponsible during good economic times. Again, Trump uses short-term gains in lieu of pursuing long-term stability.
Trump and Biden: The National Debt Trump’s Deficit Spending is much larger
Deregulation to Make Short-Term Gains
The environment is a socio-economic sector that requires government regulation. The balance of regulation versus free enterprise is an important discussion. The expected short-term impact of fewer regulations is to stimulate the regulated enterprises.
Properly implemented regulations are legislated in advance of enforcement timelines, allowing impacted companies to plan, budget, and implement changes to comply with the prospective regulation. Deregulation – the removal of existing or planned regulations – has the added impact of freeing up additional budgeted money. This worked to further heat up the Trump administration economy. Deregulation exemplifies obtaining short-term gains at the expense of hard fought long-term goals and planning.
Unemployment – confounded by COVID
Allowing for the impact of COVID, unemployment was about the same for Obama, Trump, and Biden.
The Economy Under Trump vs Biden
The Economy Under Trump vs. Biden – Wall Street Journal October 12, 2024 ‘A ‘Gift artice – No pay wall’
A resaonably quick read overview of the Trump and Biden Economies – Overall they are about the same
Just as the big drop in GDP in 2020 was more a reflection of the pandemic than of Trump’s leadership, the spurt in inflation during Biden’s tenure is in part a reflection of the supply-chain snarls brought on by the pandemic, and by the jump in oil prices brought on by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. One indication of this is that inflation elsewhere also shot up. Prices in the eurozone, for example, are about as elevated relative to the start of 2021 as they are in the U.S., while the eurozone’s economic growth has been far slower.
But few Americans are chatting about prices with their counterparts overseas. Instead, they are living with American inflation, and this is a major reason polling shows Biden gets poor marks on the economy, despite the strength in the jobs market.
Crime
Violent crime was higher in Trump’s years (2016 – 2020) than in Bidens years (2021 to 2024)
USA Facts Current State of the Union – Crime
Is the country getting safer? USA Facts
In 2022, the violent crime rate fell for the second consecutive year, down to 380.7 per 100,000 people. The property crime rate increased for the first time since 2001, up 6.7% to 1,954.4 per 100,000 people.
For the first time in two decades, larceny-theft crime rates increased (up 7.4%) in 2022.
In 2022, violent crime rates per 100,000 people decreased across all types of crimes, except for robbery.
Federal, state, and local governments spent $282.1 billion on law enforcement and corrections in 2021 — the most since at least 1980 (after adjusting for inflation).
By 2022, the number of police officers per 100,000 people had fallen 8.9% from its 2009 peak.
So, contrary to Trump’s lying rants, crime is not rampant in the US.
Crime by Immigrants
Trump says migrants are fueling violent crime. This is what the research shows:
Research on Migrant Crime Rate
“Comparing crime rates between undocumented immigrants, legal immigrants, and native-born US citizens in Texas,, opens new tab” by Michael Light, a sociology professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and two other researchers. The 2020 study was published in the peer-reviewed Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
• The report, which used data from the Texas Department of Public Safety between 2012-2018, found a lower felony arrest rate for immigrants in the U.S. illegally compared to legal immigrants and native-born U.S. citizens and no evidence of increasing criminality among immigrants.
• The libertarian think tank has published Cato Institute – Immigrant Crime Texas 2017 (link) which shows immigrants in the country commit crimes at lower rates than the native-born. In a recent USA Today Op-ed (link), Nowrasteh previewed new research that found immigrants in the U.S. illegally in Texas were about 26% less likely to be convicted of homicide than native-born Americans from 2013-2022.
Regarding One of Trump’s Favorite Lies on Immigrants
Laken Riley’s death made the news, but here’s the real story on undocumented migrants – USA Today
Jose Antonio Ibarra, who federal authorities said entered the United States illegally in 2022, was arrested last month in Georgia in the killing of Laken Riley, a 22-year-old nursing student. This case and others like it are gaining national attention during a debate over immigration policy and border security.
In his State of the Union address on March 7, President Joe Biden even mentioned that the accused killer was an “illegal.”
As tragic as these cases are, analyzing the broader facts is crucial before changing public policy. Otherwise, the government could do more harm than good.
Undocumented migrants commit fewer homicides
According to my latest research, undocumented migrants in Texas were about 26% less likely to be convicted of homicide than native-born Americans over the decade of 2013-22. Legal immigrants were about 61% less likely.
IMHO: the result, ‘a lower felony arrest rate for immigrants in the U.S. illegally compared to legal immigrants and native-born U.S. citizens’, makes sense. When you’re breaking the law (i.e. being in the U.S. illegally) don’t break the law (commit other crimes).
Healthcare
COVID Response
Spatiotemporal analysis of medical resource deficiencies in the U.S. under COVID-19 pandemic
As a matter of fact, the U.S. had the highest number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 (82,404) in the world on March 26, 2020, and surpassed Italy for the highest national death toll (20,413) on April 11, 2020 [9, 10].
The COVID-19 data clearly shows that the US per-capita cases are near the worst of any country in the world.
The notion that the data has liberal bias, or is Hilary-Soros controlled, or the result of crisis actors, or of a huge deep state conspiracy is falsifiable, ludicrous crap. These crazy notions can be circumvented by noting that COVID-19 is beyond being an epidemic. It is a pandemic.
As a pandemic, the infection counts, death counts, testing rates, etc., and data compilations are carried out by nearly all countries of the world. If you believe CNN, PBS, John Hopkins, Bloomberg news, etc., are all corrupt liberal outlets, then go to the BBC, or the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control, or Worldometer, or World Health Organization, or the Africa UN Knowledge Hub for COVID-19… BTW: I find one of the best world data compilation websites, including covering COVID-19, to be ‘Our World Data’.
Trump did not cause the COVID pandemic. Nor is he solely responsible for the poor outcome of the US. However, Trump’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic was terrible. Trump, early on knew of the severity of COVID. The obvious fact – a US President would be informed of the seriousness of an epidemic – is backed by the recorded statement of Trump by Bob Woodward, February 7,
“It goes through the air,”…”That’s always tougher than the touch. You don’t have to touch things. Right? But the air, you just breathe the air and that’s how it’s passed”. …”And so that’s a very tricky one. That’s a very delicate one. It’s also more deadly than even your strenuous flus.” From ‘Trump deliberately played down virus, Woodward book says’ Trump deliberately played down virus -Woodward
The lack of PPE availability became an indisputable problem. The Trump administration did not address nor facilitate addressing the problem. Trump repeatedly lied about the availability of PPE, testing, treatments… For a list of the ‘misinformation’ see, ‘Misinformation related to the COVID-19 pandemic, section Presidential’, COVID Pandemic Misinformation – President.
Trump’s more recent political tactic, weeks before the election, is to assert that 200,000 deaths is a success. On the campaign trail Trump has been making the absurd assertion that the Trump Administration prevented the number of deaths from being 2 million. Bullshit, re-review the US per-capita cases.
For a review of Trump’s actual role during the COVID pandemic read, ‘Dying in a Leadership Vacuum’, by The Editors of The New England Journal of Medicine Trump’s role during COVID .
“Covid-19 has created a crisis throughout the world. This crisis has produced a test of leadership. With no good options to combat a novel pathogen, countries were forced to make hard choices about how to respond. Here in the United States, our leaders have failed that test. They have taken a crisis and turned it into a tragedy.
The magnitude of this failure is astonishing. According to the Johns Hopkins Center for Systems Science and Engineering,1 the United States leads the world in Covid-19 cases and in deaths due to the disease, far exceeding the numbers in much larger countries, such as China. …”
Health Care
Compare 2024 Candidates Health Care Policy KFF
This KFF website presents a comprehensive comparison of Harrison’s and Trump’s records and plans on healthcare. I find it to be accurate. The KFF site has comparisons of:
THE AFFORDABLE CARE ACT, COVID-19, GLOBAL HEALTH POLICY, HEALTH COSTS, HEALTH MISINFORMATION AND TRUST, HIV/AIDS, MEDICAID, MEDICARE, MENTAL HEALTH, PATIENT AND CONSUMER, PROTECTIONS, PRIVATE INSURANCE, RACIAL EQUITY AND HEALTH POLICY, UNINSURED, and WOMEN’S HEALTH POLICY.
Scumbag Trump ranting about Social Security and Medicare, Immigrants.
Affordable Care Act
Donald Trump
- In 2017, unsuccessfully attempted to repeal and replace the ACA with various plans that would have increased the number of uninsured Americans to 51 million.
- Deprioritized enforcement of the individual mandate penalty, then reduced the penalty to $0.
- Stopped payments for cost-sharing subsidies (CSRs), which contributed to premiums increasing, as well as federal subsidies growing.
- Reduced funding for outreach, which may have contributed to enrollment stagnating.
- Expanded non-ACA-compliant short-term plans, which restrict coverage for pre-existing conditions.
- Allowed Enhanced Direct Enrollment in ACA plans through online brokers.
- In budget plans, proposed changes to the ACA that would weaken pre-existing protections and reduce funding substantially through a block grant to states.
- As a candidate for this election, he called to “never give up” on repealing the ACA, later adding “Obamacare Sucks” and that he would replace it with “much better healthcare.” He also said he was not running on terminating the ACA and would rather make it “much much better and far less money,” though has provided no specific plans.
Kamala Harris
- The Biden-Harris administration enacted the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA), which temporarily expanded eligibility for and increased ACA Marketplace subsidies. These were extended by the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) through 2025.
- The administration fixed the “family glitch,” allowing dependents of people with unaffordable employer-based family coverage to receive ACA subsidies.
- The administration reversed Trump administration expansion of short-term plans and restored outreach and enrollment assistance and funding.
- The administration achieved record-high enrollment in ACA Marketplace plans.
- Proposes to build on provisions in the IRA by making permanent the expanded ACA subsidies.
Environmental
[ update global warming hoax & roll back of regulations]
Foreign Policy
[ Update Afghanistan, Israel, Ukraine ]