The GOP Is Kidding Itself About the Economy

No amount of narrative-setting can convince American voters that the economy is better or worse than their own experience dictates. That’s what I’ve been telling the Republicans who’ve asked me, earnestly, if the media’s reporting on affordability is responsible for voters’ gloomy assessment of their finances.

That’s not to say that the news media (guilty as charged) doesn’t get caught up in narrative-setting from time to time. It’s our job to report on the state of the economy, domestically and globally. We rely on statistics, percentages, figures and graphs, and the performance of stock and bond markets, to fulfill that function. If the macro indicators appear to be singing from the same hymnal, well then, voilà, a cohesive media narrative on current economic conditions.