Mercifully, Donald Trump is done with his convention, and what a shambletastic trainwreck it was. Now it’s Hillary Clinton’s turn. For all the other important themes on which this campaign will turn, the one that will likely be decisive for the largest number of Americans is the same one it always is: the economy.
In addition to becoming the first female president of our country, Hillary Clinton is aiming to be the first Democrat in almost 70 years—since Harry Truman in 1948—to win the White House for her party beyond two consecutive terms.
When the economy has crashed as in 2008 or 1932—both of which took place after long periods of conservatives controlling the White House and Congress—it’s essentially impossible to do so. The incumbent party is simply disqualified, whoever the nominee. The bums get thrown out. When things are going well overall, as in 1988 or 2000, you’ve got a fighting chance. Without Barack Obama’s strong economic record, Hillary Clinton would have as much chance of winning the presidency as Melania Trump does of winning a Pulitzer Prize.
This is certainly not to suggest that Clinton simply say that Obama is great and she’s just going to follow in his footsteps. But the fact is that she’s got an economic record she can embrace, even as she lays out steps she would take to make further improvements. Additionally, the Republicans are going to attack the Obama economy either way. Donald Trump did so in Cleveland, and vice-presidential nominee Mike Pence added: “Hillary Clinton essentially offers a third Obama term.” Voters know it’s more true than false. But Hillary can use that to her advantage.
She and the Democratic Party have a compelling story to tell. That story starts with the 2008 crash, a crash that followed a period where Republicans had years to implement the policies of their choice. This one was a different kind of crash than any since the Depression. As Harvard economics professor Kenneth Rogoff explained, this one is the only one since FDR’s time that was “a systemic financial crisis,” and added, “this was like nothing we’ve experienced since World War II. The 1982 Volcker recession was nothing compared to this, and so you have to look at the nature of the shock.” I’m not suggesting Hillary go out and quote Dr. Rogoff this week in Philadelphia, but unlike Donald Trump, why not give experts their due.
Given the hole we were in, how have we done since then? Let’s look at a wide array of measures. Yes, the stock market has tripled in value from the low it hit a few weeks after President Obama was inaugurated. But that’s far from the only area of strength in the Obama record. The Obama presidency has helped Main Street as well as Wall Street.
The unemployment rate peaked at 10 percent during his first year, and it’s now under 5 percent. An even broader measure of the job market is the total number of job openings. In April we hit 5,845,000, and even after a drop in May the number remains higher than at any point during George W. Bush’s presidency. It has almost tripled since the low point reached six months after Obama took office.
First-time unemployment claims likewise show a very strong hiring environment. They have come in below 300,000 for 72 weeks in a row, a streak not seen since 1973. He’s also brought the rate of long-term unemployment down from more than 4 percent in late 2009—by far the worst rate since the Depression—to just over 1 percent now, a rate roughly in line with the historical average. How about paychecks? Real weekly earnings (i.e., earnings after inflation) have grown by 4.2 percent during the Obama presidency, and are up 5.7 percent from the nadir hit in June 2009.
One of the biggest hot button issues right now is trade. Under President Obama, our trade deficit has—and this one surprised me—fallen by 29 percent as of this April. Additionally, U.S. exports of goods and services, which bottomed out in the first quarter of 2009, have increased by 43 percent from that point through the first quarter of 2016.
Finally, here’s a visual representation of one piece of data. This one doesn’t measure the performance of the economy, but instead shows how President Obama has made the federal tax code significantly more progressive—“the most progressive in a generation,” according to what tax experts told the New York Times. The top 1 percent now pay as high an average rate as they did before Ronald Reagan took office and slashed tax rates for the rich.
Overall, despite all the economic problems we still face, more people think they’re doing better under President Obama than do not. When Gallup did a survey this January and asked Americans if they felt better off than they did eight years earlier, i.e., before the Great Recession, 50 percent said yes, and 42 percent said no, with 6 percent saying they were just as well off. Separate from how voters feel about Donald Trump, he won’t be able to win asking them the famous question Reagan asked voters in 1980.
How does all this affect Hillary Clinton’s campaign? Five Thirty Eight examined a slew of polls done in recent weeks, and compiled the data on issues. When voters were asked whom they prefer, Secretary Clinton led Trump on eight out of ten. One where Trump was slightly ahead was “terrorism”, where he led by 3 points, but even that was balanced out by Clinton’s lead on two related issues: she led by 24 on “foreign policy” and by 18 on “international crisis.” Her worst issue was “economy/jobs”— where Trump led her by 7 points.
Additionally, respondents have rated “economy/jobs” the most important issue (out of seven choices) in the NBC/Survey Monkey tracking poll the last 15 times they’ve been asked. Hillary must—and I’m confident she will—attack this area of strength for Trump. She can do so by highlighting the truly impressive turnaround engineered by the president whose legacy she will both preserve and build upon.
In 2008, Democrats made the following deal with America: you gave the Republicans a chance to run things, and they’ve run them into the ground. Give us a chance and we’ll do better. Eight years later, Democrats can now say: We did. Crucially, the changes Democrats made—such as Obamacare, changing the tax rates on high incomes, and increasing the Earned Income Tax Credit, to give a few examples, are also making a real impact on the matter of income inequality. Electing Hillary Clinton will ensure we’re able to maintain these policies and—if we elect enough Democrats to Congress—make them work even more effectively. Electing Donald Trump means they’ll be reversed. Simple as that.
Although we’ve got more to do, and we’ve got more problems to solve when it comes to helping all Americans make ends meet, the record shows that our approach works better than theirs. We know what the hell we’re doing. Furthermore, Hillary Clinton will push for the right kinds of new policies, policies aimed at making the economy work better for the 99 percent, not just for those at the very top.
Donald Trump? In addition to all the other reasons he shouldn’t be president, on the economy he’d be Dubya on steroids—his tax plan funnels money to the top 1 percent by the truckload and adds $12 trillion to our national debt over 10 years. Why in the world would America want that?
Had Al Gore chosen to run with instead of away from the record of the incumbent president he served, he’d almost certainly have become president. Thankfully, Hillary Clinton knows better.
Ian Reifowitz is the author of Obama’s America: A Transformative Vision of Our National Identity (Potomac Books).