What stats spell

To the editor:

I must be missing something. I read that 51 percent of American voters disapprove of President Biden’s handling of the economy. Yet, every economic indicator shows that the economy under Biden is doing extremely well.

According to the Bureau of Economic Analysis, U.S. GDP in constant 2012 dollars was $18.92 trillion for 2020 and $20.4 trillion by June 2023; an average annual increase of 3.13 percent under Biden. For comparison purposes, under President Trump, who most Americans agree did well handling the economy, GDP went from $17.81 trillion to $18.92 trillion during his time in office; an average annual growth rate of 1.56 percent. 

In other words, inflation-adjusted GDP has grown twice as fast under Biden relative to Trump.

The next economic metric is employment. When Biden took office, total non-farm employment was 142.969 million jobs. Through July 2023, total employment stood at 156.342 million, a net increase of 13.373 million jobs.  

With respect to unemployment, the rate was 6.3 percent when Biden took office and stands at 3.5 percent now. Under Trump, fewer people were employed when he left office (143 million) than when he entered (145.6 million), the first president to lose jobs since Herbert Hoover, and unemployment went from 4 percent to 6.3 percent.

I believe the disconnect between the polling and the data is due to divided politics. Essentially, opinions are based upon ideology and not fact. This has serious consequences for our democracy. Our Founding Fathers well understood this danger. John Adams said “Liberty cannot be preserved without general knowledge among the people.” And Thomas Jefferson stated “If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be.” That says it all.

Joseph Cannisi