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It wasn’t long ago when Republicans expected to focus heavily on the economy in the 2024 elections. Reality has gotten in the way.
In fact, it was just a few weeks ago when The New York Times reported that the U.S. job market “is as healthy as it has ever been” — as in, in the history of the United States — and described recent economic growth as “robust.” A few days later, The Washington Post’s Heather Long explained in a column that by “just about every measure, the U.S. economy is in good shape. Growth is strong. Unemployment is low. Inflation is back down. More important, many Americans are getting sizable pay raises, and middle-class wealth has surged to record levels. We are living through one of the best economic years of many people’s lifetimes.”
The same day, Politico described the status quo as “a dream economy.”
But there’s also an international dimension to this. The Wall Street Journal reported:
The U.S. is increasingly pulling ahead of the world’s advanced economies, with a surge of investment paying off in higher productivity and wages. The International Monetary Fund highlights those divergent paths in its latest global scorecard, released Tuesday. In what has become something of a trend, the IMF upgraded the outlook for both U.S. and global growth, though more for the former.
Among the world’s wealthiest nations, the IMF doesn’t just see the U.S. economy as the world’s strongest, it also expects Americans to see the fastest growth on the planet as 2024 comes to a close.
Officials at the IMF aren’t the only ones who’ve noticed: The Economist, a leading British publication, recently described the U.S. economy as “the envy of the world,” adding that the American economy “has left other rich countries in the dust.”
Around this time four years ago, Donald Trump told supporters that Democratic policies would “unleash an economic disaster of epic proportions” and force the country “into depression.”
Oops.
Of course, the larger question isn’t just about the status quo, it’s also about the future. The U.S. economy is strong now, but what about what’s to come?
As it turns out, 23 Nobel Prize-winning economists endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris over Trump in a joint letter released this week, explaining that the Republican’s agenda would “lead to higher prices, larger deficits, and greater inequality.”
“Simply put, Harris’s policies will result in a stronger economic performance, with economic growth that is more robust, more sustainable, and more equitable,” the letter added.
The Nobel laureates aren’t alone. The Wall Street Journal also recently asked economists a related question and found that most economists think “inflation, interest rates and deficits would be higher” under Trump’s agenda than Harris’ agenda.
“Look, you may not like Donald Trump personally, but you’ll like his policies a lot better than Kamala Harris’,” Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp recently said. The Republican added that voters are simply “making a business decision.”
Given everything we now know, those focused on the economy and business decisions should be rallying behind Harris as quickly as possible, hoping desperately that Trump loses.