THANKS TO TRUMP’S DEREGULATION, TAX & TRADE POLICIES …
If you’re tired of being constantly bombarded by negative news, here’s a positive takeaway from the latest Rasmussen Report …
Forty-one percent (41%) of likely U.S. voters think the country is heading in the right direction.
The table below, which represents the average ‘right direction / wrong track’ numbers in 2009 – 2019, shows the right direction numbers ran in the 20’s during most of the Obama years and then improved significantly once Trump took office.
The ‘right direction / wrong track’ numbers are trending positively after significant improvements in 2017 and 2018.
These trends shouldn’t be surprising, considering how well the American economy is doing:
As reported by OMB, real GDP grew at 3.1 percent over the four quarters of 2018, despite the Obama administration’s anemic recovery over the previous eight years and their 2018 growth forecast of only 2.3%.
According to TRADINGECONOMICS.COM, U.S. corporations are achieving record profits in the Trump economy:
Corporate profits in the United States rose by USD 69.3 billion, or 3.5 percent, to an all-time high of USD 2,076.8 billion in the third quarter of 2018, following a 2.1 percent increase in the previous period and above the preliminary estimate and market expectations of a 3.3 percent gain.
As a direct result of U.S. corporate success, the economy added just under 4.9 million jobs since January 2017, including 454,000 manufacturing jobs.
African American, Hispanic American and Asian American unemployment have reached their lowest levels ever recorded.
Currently there are more job openings (> 7 million) than people looking for work (< 6.5 million).
While the wage and salary growth rate (left scale in chart below) has risen to 4.2%, the core inflation rate (right scale) is only half as much at 2.2%. So net income is truly growing.
The value of 401(k) savings plans and retiree pensions depends substantially upon stock market performance. In the 741 days after President Trump was elected, the DJIA’s returns were the best since Eisenhower and more than twice the returns of Obama at the same point following his election in 2008. Here’s how the broader market has performed to date during Trump’s administration: Dow (+41.36%), S&P 500 (+30.09%), NASDAQ (+45.06%).
So why have the American economy, stock markets, businesses, workers and consumers done so well since 2017?
Sixty three million Americans elected Donald Trump as their president on November 8, 2016 in large part because of his campaign promises to improve the economy:
ELIMINATE TWO REGULATIONS FOR EVERY NEW ONE: President Trump wasted no time in reducing unnecessary regulation and harassment of business. Deregulation reduced the political uncertainty that had caused businesses to delay or reduce investment. Now, per WSJ reporting, business investment is booming again, as evidenced by the gross private domestic (non-residential) investment numbers in the chart below:
TAX CUTS: As stated in the Heritage Foundation analysis of the The 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act:
The tax act is the most sweeping update to the U.S. tax code in more than 30 years. The bill will lower taxes on businesses and individuals and unleash higher wages, more jobs, and untold opportunity through a larger and more dynamic economy. The bill includes many pro-growth features, including a deep reduction in the corporate tax rate, a scaled-back state and local tax deduction, full expensing for five years, and lower individual tax rates. This is a serious effort to reform a complex and badly broken system and provides significant tax relief to the vast majority of taxpaying Americans.
As we have already seen above, permanently lowering the highest corporate tax rate in the world to 21% and inviting companies to repatriate profits held abroad has caused business investment to pick up, thereby creating more economic demand and supply, resulting in GDP and job growth that experts said would never be seen again. For the vast majority of individual Americans, the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act will lower their federal tax bill through lower tax rates, a larger standard deduction, and an expanded child tax credit.
RENEGOTIATE BAD TRADE DEALS (e.g., NAFTA) AND NEGOTIATE NEW RECIPROCAL TRADE DEALS WITH SOUTH KOREA, CHINA & THE EU: While some quarrel with Trump’s use of tariffs as a negotiating tool to protect U.S. national security, intellectual property and jobs, the President’s trade negotiations thus far appear to be succeeding in leveling the playing field for U.S. companies, growing the economy and bringing back manufacturing jobs. His America First efforts have given U.S. businesses and consumers the confidence to invest and spend.
Measured business and consumer confidence data have recovered handsomely from a downward trend in 2015 and 2016.
Of course, there is much more to do — making individual tax cuts permanent, improving health care availability and cost, securing borders, fixing a broken immigration system, rebuilding infrastructure, etc — but the American people are right to believe we’re heading in the right direction because of the impressive economic progress made in the past two years … even if the mainstream media hardly ever report it.