As inflationary pressures appear to be easing, the potential implications for President Joe Biden’s bid for reelection are coming into focus.
Yahoo Finance’s Rick Newman dives into the relationship between economic conditions and voter sentiment, providing insight into how a potential slowdown in the US economy may shape the political landscape.
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This post was written by Angel Smith
Video Transcript
Inflation began to make its way back to normal levels a step in the right direction for President Biden’s rele odds, but there’s still some concerns lurking in the shadows.
Yahoo Finance’s senior columnist, Rick Newman joins us now with more Rick, hey guys, I feel like I could just pick up where Ryan left off.
I mean, he was talking about uh jobless claims, for example, people filing for unemployment insurance.
Uh there was jump in that number this week that definitely got economists attention.
I mean, the old saying is uh one number doesn’t make a trend but compare that with some other things.
We know we’ve seen a big uh decline in the number of job openings still higher than before COVID, but that’s been coming down a lot and uh anecdotally you’re hearing a lot of the retail chain, Walmart Target Walgreens say uh they’re, they’re lowering prices, which is a good thing.
But the reason they’re doing it is that people are just not spending money anymore.
At the same time, we know the so called excess savings that people put in the bank during COVID.
That is basically all gone.
So, uh I mean, this is, you know, one of those sort of softening scenarios.
I, I’m not ringing recession bells here, but I’m watching a lot of economists who say this bears watching.
This could be the labor market slowdown that many have and anticipating for some time.
And what does that mean for President Biden?
I mean, inflation is finally going his way.
Uh It could be more or less back to normal levels, at least with regard to goods by the fall.
But what if we uh suddenly start to have softness in the labor market and people start to get worried about job security.
Uh And uh they start to even possibly see layoffs happening around them.
I mean, in a way, it almost seems like Biden can’t win on the economy.
So we’re not there yet.
Bears watching.
Well, Rick, and let’s talk a little bit more about how the White House is framing this right now that we have these latest inflation numbers.
I’m curious, you know, this has been the, the problem along from the perspective of the White House, I guess is that people are not really accepting that the economy is doing ok. Now, if it’s gonna be doing a little bit worse, that makes their job even harder.
Exactly.
Right.
Uh And I guess the way I would phrase it, Julie is there aren’t enough people, not enough Americans think the economy is doing ok.
I mean, there certainly are plenty of people who are doing ok.
I mean, anybody with a stock market portfolio, which according to Gallup is like 60% of Americans, you know, they’re watching their nest egg uh go up in value.
If you, if you’re lucky enough to own a home for the last few years, you probably refinanced your mortgage at around 3%.
So a lot of those people are doing ok.
It’s just, it’s just not enough for Biden.
Um And that’s why he consistently lags Trump when it comes to approval on the economy and why his overall approval is just so weak.
So, you know, Biden basically has the same line when he talks about the economy, he brags about everything that’s going right, record number of jobs created under his presidency that is accurate.
But then he says we have more work to do on inflation.
We have to keep working to get inflation down.
And um voters, you know, either they’re not buying it really or they’re just not even listening to Biden because uh there’s no evidence that he’s getting more credit for the economy even as prices have come down and gas prices by the way, have been coming down.
So Biden just needs all those trends to continue and hope he can just persuade enough people in the fall that things are ok.
I mean, this is going to be a very narrow margin of victory no matter who wins.
So that’s what Biden’s hoping for.
Rick just quickly.
I’m curious.
We talked yesterday, I believe about former president Trump meeting with a bunch of CEO S and sort of making his pitch on taxes.
We did hear some news on Biden’s tax plans this week.
Do we know though?
What kind of meetings he’s having with CEO S?
And if he’s trying to make his pitch directly to them, I think what Biden is trying to do is basically be presidential.
I mean, this is what an incumbent president is supposed to do to get re-elected.
So, uh it could have been a, been a uh a coincidence of the schedule, but Biden this week was over in Europe talking with other leaders of the so-called G7 countries, you know, mingling among the most powerful people in the world.
So, uh I guess he’s sort of trying to communicate his position um by the bully pulpit.
He has as being a world leader, uh you know, participating in some of the most important uh decisions in the world.
But we’re going to hear more about all of this directly from Biden.
Don’t forget the debate is coming up on June 27 that is must watch TV.
And if it’s too late for uh anybody out there, I will be watching it and detailing everything that is when Biden is really going to be able to make his pitch and then we’ll have another uh debate in the fall.
Um I think those are gonna be pretty important this year.
And for anybody who hasn’t made up their mind yet, and there are some of those people that will get to hear what these two guys have to say and that could help them make up their minds.
We shall see Rick.
Thank you.
Uh Thanks, thanks in advance for watching the debate and keeping track of it too.
Have a great weekend.
