Biden’s Economic Record Beats Trump’s, With Some Caveats
Exclude the pandemic, and the latest GDP data makes the former president look a bit better and the current one a bit worse. But the pandemic was a pretty big deal.
The pandemic skews the numbers.
Photographer: Spencer Platt/Getty Images
Included in this week’s gross domestic product release were revisions of the past five years of GDP and related data. They make Joe Biden’s presidency look pretty good, economically speaking. Not only has the inflation-adjusted GDP growth rate since he took office in 2021 surpassed that of Donald Trump’s four years in office, it has also surpassed the 3% annual growth rate that was a favorite target of Trump’s.
The chart includes gross domestic income, a measure derived from different data sources than GDP that should in theory equal it but in practice never does. There is some indication that GDI, or an average of GDP and GDI, reflects the timing of economic fluctuations more accurately than GDP alone does, which is why I’ve been using it in my presidential economic growth accountings for several years now. While there will be one more GDP report before the election — the “advance” estimate on Oct. 30 — the third-quarter GDI number won’t be out until late November.