Joe Biden and Kamala Harris could not sell voters on the strength of the economy. Now, Donald Trump is poised to enter the White House with booming markets and solid growth. Expect him to reap the political rewards.
The long-term consequences of the highest inflation in four decades are still dragging down consumer sentiment, and Trump fueled that pessimism on the campaign trail by relentlessly arguing that the economy was in a freefall. With the election over, he’s likely to have a much easier job convincing Americans that times are actually pretty good.
“Trump is an extraordinarily effective brander and marketer. He’s just more confident,” said Joseph LaVorgna, who was chief economist for Trump’s National Economic Council. “And confidence is everything.”
The U.S. has been a rare bright spot in the global economy, but Democrats were still unable to generate political momentum from a domestic hiring and consumer spending boom. Politically toxic inflation has been falling for more than two years, gas costs are down and price growth for groceries has dipped well below 2 percent, yet “Bidenomics” and Harris’ plans for an “opportunity economy” failed to resonate with voters.
Trump played a big role in assuring the economy would remain a vulnerability, hammering the administration for creating an “economic catastrophe” after he had handed them a “perfect economy.” But some of the president-elect’s favorite gauges for assessing economic performance have been humming. The stock market repeatedly hit record highs in recent months, even before his reelection sent traders into a frenzy. The economy grew at a healthy 2.7 percent pace during the third quarter. And even though the labor market has been choppy lately, the jobless rate has fallen well below where it was when he left office.
Incoming presidents who defeat an incumbent party are rarely dealt so strong a hand. For Trump, who has long treated high-level economic data as a scorecard, the challenge will be to convince the public that the economy’s current trajectory is a result of his return to power. Some of his top allies on Wall Street — including financiers in line for roles in his administration — have been cranking out op-eds and cable news hits to trumpet how markets surged after he was reelected. (Trump, for his part, made a point of attributing a market surge earlier this year to his ascendance in the polls.)
