Trump Sketches Economy in Bullet Points While Biden Takes Policy Dive

America’s presidential election is entering its closing stretch with the economy still stuck in a pandemic slump, and the candidates locked in a tight battle over the best way to pull it out.

The economy looked like a winner for President Donald Trump through most of his first term, with strong growth and unemployment declining. During the first months of the coronavirus recession, he maintained a polling lead on the issue. But lately there are signs that Democratic challenger Joe Biden is catching up.

Some of the policy gaps between the candidates are age-old: The Republican says he’ll cut taxes and red tape, while the Democrat promises to spend more. Others reflect contrasting approaches to new challenges like climate change and competition with China. And on a handful of issues, they broadly agree.

There’s also been a big difference in presentation, with a slew of detailed policy proposals emerging from the Biden campaign, while Trump prefers to list promises in terse bullet-points.

Whoever wins has a better-than-usual chance of actually implementing their proposals, because the pandemic has blown away old budget restraints, according to Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics. “There’s a real good chance that a lot of them may become law.”