WASHINGTON, DC – President Joe Biden is focusing on kitchen-table issues seven months before a critical test from voters in the midterm elections, as he struggles to get credit for a recovering economy.
Job growth has been strong and consistent since Biden took office last year, as he told the country on Friday after the March jobs report showed a net gain of 431,000 jobs and a low unemployment rate of 3.6 percent. However, he acknowledged that food and gas prices are too high, and inflation is at its highest level in a generation, tempering his remarks.
For Biden, persuading Americans of the economy’s progress serves only as a stark reminder of how far the country still has to go.
“Our economy has progressed from being on the mend to being on the move,” Biden said, acknowledging that Americans are not yet ready for a victory lap. “I understand that this job isn’t done: we still have work to do to bring prices under control.”
Biden’s jumbled messaging, like the state of the economy, can appear to be a jumble of contradictions at times. It forces voters to form their own opinions, potentially jeopardizing the president’s political future.
For example, record wage gains of 5.6 percent over the last year contrast with annual consumer price increases of 7.9 percent.
Biden’s announcement this week of plans to release a million barrels of oil per day from the US strategic reserve over the next six months was a recognition of the negative impact that inflation can have not only on the economy but also on his own policy goals.
The public’s dissatisfaction with the economy is reflected in Biden’s polling numbers.
According to a March poll by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, nearly two-thirds of Americans believe the economy is in bad shape, and nearly two-thirds disapprove of Biden’s economic leadership.
Administration officials and Biden allies are pleased with the job creation figures, but they are concerned about the lingering economic downturn, which threatens him with a historically hostile environment for a president’s party in a midterm election year.
They advised Biden to highlight his efforts to reduce gas prices as well as his upcoming efforts to try to prevent food price increases as a result of the war raging in the world’s breadbasket, Ukraine.
He isn’t just focusing on the family budget. Biden’s latest message to voters is that he can also control the country’s finances.
His annual budget request highlighted a $1 trillion reduction in the deficit over ten years, an effort to claim the mantle of fiscal stewardship despite the fact that the reduction was driven by the expiration of no longer necessary COVID-19 relief programs and a new plan for a minimum tax on the country’s billionaires.
Democratic pollster John Anzalone, who advised Biden’s 2020 campaign, said, “Responsible fiscal accountability is always a priority with voters.” “I believe that people are looking for fiscal accountability.” And I don’t believe that has changed over time.”
Biden’s aides also hope that he will be able to devote more time to other ways that the government is working to improve people’s lives, such as infrastructure investments and the improving economy.
Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the Democratic presidential nominee in 2016, said there appeared to be a “disconnect” between Biden’s legislative accomplishments and his handling of the Ukraine war and public perception.
“I understand that midterm elections are always difficult for the ruling party, but we have a great story to tell,” he said “On Sunday, she told NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “There are a lot of good accomplishments to be proud of, and Democrats in office and out need to do a better job of presenting them.””
Rep. Annie Kuster, D-N.H., said after meeting with Biden on Wednesday that his recent messaging has clearly targeted moderate voters.
Outside the White House, she said, “The State of the Union was spot on in terms of what constituents in our districts, purple districts, are talking about right now.” She praised Biden for shifting his focus after the pandemic to mental health issues, while also emphasizing that the president intends to run on infrastructure and job creation.
With a sense of pessimism, voters interpreted the pandemic, the recession, the burst of government spending, the quick recovery, and the inflation that followed.
The partisan breakdown of numbers in the University of Michigan’s consumer sentiment survey shows growing anxiety among Democrats, whom Biden needs to turn out in 2022.
Democrats’ economic expectations have been declining since July, while independents’ economic expectations have been at their lowest since 2008, when the country was engulfed in the Great Recession.
This skepticism has been fueled by rising oil and gasoline prices. Crude oil prices began the year at around $76 per barrel, soared to around $124 on March 8 following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and appeared to settle just below $100 on Friday after Biden announced the withdrawal from the reserves.
The market reaction to Biden’s release of petroleum was “muted,” according to Desmond Lachman, a senior fellow at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, who added that “in the short term we are subject to the whims of outside developments like the Russian invasion.”
There is evidence that the public’s perception of inflation is worse than actual inflation, according to University of Michigan economist Justin Wolfers, whose work is separate from the sentiment survey. Because gasoline, food, and other items with openly displayed prices are major drivers of higher prices, inflation may have a disproportionate psychological impact.
Wolfers has done academic research on the impact of oil prices on gubernatorial elections, but he cautioned that historical comparisons may be difficult to make after the financial and cultural effects of a pandemic that has shattered expectations.
“If I were Biden, I’d say something along the lines of ‘better off than four years ago,'” Wolfers said. He said voters should recall June 2020, when the world was in the grip of a pandemic, the government was providing false information about the pandemic, the economy was in shambles, and “you also didn’t know whether you were going to die.”
“How are you feeling right now?” “That would be the case,” he explained.
Jill Colvin of the Associated Press contributed to this report.
Source: ABC
