From Josh Barro: “This Is the Economy We’ll Be Going Into the Election With”

Photo by DesignOne, CC BY-SA 4.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

With “it’s the economy, stupid” accepted political truth, the chattering classes question in an election year should turn to what kind of economy are we going to have on election day.

Josh Barro writing on his SubStack proffers this is what it is going to be:

It’s too late for Biden to do much about this before the election. A couple of months ago, I spoke with Tim Miller about whether Biden should publicly lean on the Fed to cut rates, as Trump did in 2018 (and George H.W. Bush did in 1991-2). At the time, I said I was uncertain about whether doing so would actually benefit Biden — it’s a norm violation, and if any voters care about that sort of thing, it’s likely to be the Haley voters he’s courting — but I now think there’s just no chance it would work. You won’t convince Fed officials that rate cuts are justified right now with the inflation data we’ve seen recently, and a public pressure campaign from one side could make it too politically fraught for the Fed to cut rates closer to the election, even if better data has come in by then.

Nor can Biden do much to change the near-term inflation situation. There are things he should have done months or years ago — a smaller American Rescue Plan, less student debt relief, more open trade policy — that would have eased inflationary pressure and given the Fed more room to set lower interest rates. But anything he does in the fiscal arena now is only likely to have significant effects on prices after the election.

U.S. President Joe Biden spoke about funding for the I-535 Blatnik Bridge at Earth Rider Brewery on January 25, 2024 in Superior, Wisconsin. Wisconsin is currently an above-average economic performer, with both inflation (2.6%) and unemployment (3.0%) significantly below national rates. This may be a reason Biden’s poll numbers are better in Wisconsin than any other swing state. (Photo by Stephen Maturen/Getty Images)
There’s been some hand-wringing among liberals about President Biden apparently being in denial about polling that shows him narrowly trailing Trump in an election where he likely needs to win the popular vote by a few points to overcome the structural bias of the Electoral College. I’m not sure he is in denial — his acceptance of a debate next month, three months earlier than the usual start to debates, is not the move of a candidate who doesn’t think he needs to shake up the race. But I also don’t know what good it would do for Biden to worry more.

Suppose he decides he’s on track to lose. What does that mean he should do differently? Just because he’s trailing doesn’t mean he’s currently making tactical campaign errors that he can fix to win.

As I say, it’s too late to change the economic fundamentals that are his main problem. I don’t personally find the “Greedflation” concept convincing, but as a political message, urging grocers to cut prices (as the president did yesterday) is better than saying nothing or pretending inflation isn’t a problem. If he withdrew from the race, as I still sometimes see people urge, that would just lead to a nomination for Vice President Harris, who is less popular than Biden and no more able to escape responsibility for current economic conditions. Back in February when Biden ducked the pre-Super Bowl interview, I was concerned that he wasn’t getting out there enough, but now he has been getting out there and doing quite a few interviews. Most journalists don’t like this, but I think it’s been smart to pick non-traditional venues like The Howard Stern Show and the SmartLess podcast, where he’s less likely to face adversarial questioning and more likely to reach the less-engaged voters who are his main source of trouble in the polls. (The staff of The New York Times are obviously especially annoyed that Biden won’t be interviewed by them, but I am not concerned that Biden is failing to shore up his vote share among NYT readers or reporters.)