Explaining Trump’s Appeal, Part 1
by Mike Kimel
Explaining Trump’s Appeal, Part 1
The reason Donald Trump has been unstoppable so far is that Republicans, and now Democrats as well, don’t seem to understand what motivates Trump voters. The single most important driver is, as (almost) always, the economy. The table below illustrates the problem:
Figure 1
As the graphs shows, American real economic growth rates have been awful since the year 2000. The economy has performed worse than in any other comparable period since 1930, which includes the Great Depression. This is largely the fault of the two men who were Presidents at this time, but they had a lot of help.
When the people who got us here – Republicans and Democrats alike – tell us that the economy isn’t so bad, it doesn’t sound credible to people whose gut matches the numbers. Only the gullible, or those have done well but have no empathy believe it. So when both parties are peddling similar economic policies – in fact, the very policies that were in place when we got where we are now – upsetting the apple cart becomes more than appealing. It becomes rational.
That leaves an opening for a guy like Trump who promises he will truly deliver on Obama’s campaign promise to bring Hope and Change. Trump is erratic enough to prove that if he wins, change of some sort will come, and for many, without change there is no longer room for hope.
You don’t recall the 2007-8 recession and the Republican dominated Congress since 2010? And you blame both presidents?
The growth rate has been in decline since 1980 (10 year running mean), which was already very clearly evident many years ago. Moreover the declining rate was steeper than the ascending rate to 1980, indicating only that the US economies global competitive power was significantly receding.
As the declining growth rate continued it was bound to have an effect in politics sooner or later… and since the decline was fundamentally due to increasing economic strength of other nations there was little if anything US politics could do about it without major changes to reverse US competitive decline.
Such type and rate of changes are antithetical to the US political two party system, which of course is designed, among constitution provisions to minimize the rate of change even if there’s a political consensus a) to do so, and b) in what changes need to be made.
Trump’s being favored by a very large plurality of constituents, and Sander’s the same on the other side of the political divide are only symptoms of the reasons for the decline in US growth.
So yes, “its the economy, stupid” is the reason for the conservative constituents finding Trump’s rhetoric more favorable to them than their prior leaders, but it’s not the economy since 200 that’s to blame… it’s the failure of our political system to reach consensus to deal with the long term decline in US economic growth since 1980!… not since 2000..
Hey gang, it has been awhile.
I see there are still some faith-based believers in the art of economics.
What an interesting chart. The most destructive decade being the winner, and the decades which produced the most billionaires and millionaires bringing up the rear. And here we are after surviving these 2 ‘worst-est’ decades and even most homeless folks have cell-phones, and most folks living below the poverty line also have flat-screen TVs, and automobiles.
Sure Ray:
Good to see you back. I hope you had fun on your vacation.
How about providing a link to the table you’re using – or a screen shot.
I’m looking at Table 7.1 – Selected Per Capita Product and Income Series in Current and Chained Dollars (2009) and the numbers don’t seem to be matching up with what you’ve produced above.
For example the NIPA data I’m seeing in table 7.1 shows per capita GDP of $858 (current dollars) or $8669 (chained 2009) for the period of 1930 – 1940 the chart shows that per capita income did not recover to the 1930 level until 1940 or 1942 depending upon which set of data you’re using – hardly a 2% annualized growth rate for the decade.
To get the data set I’m referring to I went to: http://www.bea.gov/iTable/iTable.cfm?ReqID=9&step=1#reqid=9&step=3&isuri=1&904=1929&903=264&906=a&905=2015&910=x&911=1
This may just send you to the list of tables rather than the modified data but simply modify Table 7.1 to show years 1929-2015. This gives yearly figures which it appears you have combined by decade in some way.
If your overall point is that growth has been stagnant the last few years, that’s sort of a given and to be expected after the sort of financial shock we had in 2007. Kindleberger, George Cooper and others through Rogoff and Rheinhart have pointed out that depression/recessions caused by financial shocks tend to take longer to recover from.
One could also point out that the Republican Congress has been adding headwinds to the recovery by trying to impose austerity.
If you’re arguing that Trump voters are low information and basically innumerate then I would probably have to agree with you. The problem is less one of stagnant growth than one of income inequality and the increasing financialization of the economy which leads to even more inequality. Whatever gains the economy has experienced have been unequally shared. Combined with the increasing shift away from worker protections this definitely makes some people uneasy.
Are people scared and insecure economically? Yes, with some good reason. Does that make them more susceptible to appeals to fear and anger at “the other”? Well that has been historically true.
America has been built on a number of myths. Throughout our history is has been relatively easy for demagogues and populists to stir folks up, especially those that use what Hofstadter called “the paranoid style”. What may be different is the way the world has shrunk through transportation, ease of capital movement and especially social media.
Donald Trump is a new and more toxic flavor of a recipe that is as old as the Republic.
Sorry, but Donald Trump has no more appeal than past Republican candidates such as George W Bush.
He talks a big game in a neo-liberal way. Lets face it “Left Wing” conservatism has been dying since the mid-20th century. If I said “I would join the Green Party if they weren’t multi-cultural” people would scratch their head going “like what”? CONEUROPE is where that “leftist” form of conservatism still exists in some corners, but in the US/UK, it is dead, dead and dead.
Trump is a neo-liberal that is being voted by groups of people who support neo-liberalism…….or so they think. Saying your will raise taxes on trade doesn’t change that, when you want a even more deregulated capital markets.
M Jamison,
Argh. I pulled the data prior to the July 29 revision.
That said, current 1930 figures for 1930 (7847), increased at 2.0187% a year for 10 years, give you 9583, which is the 1940 real gdp per capita.
Despite the BEA’s revision, without recalculating everything I think results still hold. Which is to say, growth is stagnant and has been that way since 2000.
And no, stagnation does not automatically a shock. Go back to the thirties. As early as 1933-1934, we had double digit increases in real gdp per cap. Then 8.2% the following year. Then 12.2% the year after that. The shock was bigger in 1929-1932, but the policies pursued for recovery were also very different.
JackD,
The last row is all post recession. But most economic policy was still the same as it had been from 2001 to 2009. That isn’t GW’s fault. He wasn’t in office any more.
Long tooth,
As per the table above, 1970-1980 and the decades that followed all had about the same growth rate.
M.,
Excellent comment.
It might be helpful too, in an effort to build on that, to include the fact that a vast network of lies has left the American people very confused. So, many of the Trump supporters, who are so often disparaged, are not so much stupid as they are overwhelmed with faulty information. On the subject of jobs for example, the problem has much more to do with workers being replaced by machines and etc…than it has to do with trade-related issues. But of course nearly every candidate promises to rectify the off-shoring and job loss to foreign venues and so on.
Then too, the media does little to hold the lines where integrity is concerned, and, others, (teachers, professors, public officials, corporations, and etc) that have a voice, they don’t help much either with their outdated or dishonest contributions. Plus, here on the web, the conversation typically devolves into insult slinging competitions and mangled efforts to converse. So, this Trump phenomenon is far more than just the result of economic factors, and I have only touched on one of the most salient factors.
Another key factor being that the political parties have made our electoral process a matter of dividing the population into ‘blocs’ which are routinely defined by race, ethnicity, and religion, and thus we are divided before things even start. But of course the ruling-class has been using the divide and conquer strategy against the working-class for so long that most Americans have accepted the process. And accordingly, Trump’s disregard for appeasing the Hispanic bloc has set him apart at just the right time.
Mike Kimel: why do you continue to forget the Republican Congress? Also, how come someone who starts some bad thing gets to be innocent after successor can’t fix it?
Ray LaPan-Love,
It is certainly the case that the signal to noise ratio the average voter gets is very low.
JackD,
1. And yet, some Presidents deal with more hostile Congresses. Obama’s most recent Democrat predecessor, Bill Clinton, would be one example. Besides, there are precious few examples of economic policies Obama was pushing that didn’t go through. Can you name any that would have moved the needle?
2. Coming into office during periods of problems is as much an opportunity for a competent President as it is an issue for an incompetent one. FDR came into office in much worse times, and generated far better outcomes. Besides, GW gets the credit or blame for what happened on his watch. But once he left the White House, the buck stopped with Obama. He campaigned for the job, after all. It’s not like anyone forced it on him. Nor did anyone force him to propose the policies he did. Besides, by your standards, Obama is leaving a number of messes for his successor to deal with. For instance, by not making an example of any of the people who brought us the 2007-2008 meltdown, he’s made it far more likely that another meltdown will occur. But guess what? When he wanders off into whatever bucket of cash that is waiting for him at the tail end of next January, what happens next is on his successor.
Kimel,
It is utterly astounding that Trump’s appeal to outright racism and bigotry is totally ignored in your assessment of what the Trump voter is swayed by. It is racial and its as racial as has been the Republican leadership’s opposition to just about everything Obama has tried to do in the past eight years.
What hasw Trump said that would sway middle class white men to thinking that he will “fix” a broken system. My goodness Trump is the very essence of our economic system. What’s good for Trump is good for all, and what’s good for all is good if it is better for Trump. Having started off with a family fortune of about a quarter of a billion dollars twenty to thirty years ago, he’s not progressed all that well when one understands that he’s had a hand in Manhattan real estate throughout that period. Not to mention his record in Atlantic City, which is abysmal.
Bigotry and racism has been running amuck in this country for generations and may be experiencing its last spike at what is hopefully its final few decades, or less.
Mike, I give you Mitch McConnell: our goal is to make sure President Obama fails. FDR, you apparently don’t recall, had Democratic congresses. You are correct that to the extent that President Obama contributed to the problem he continues to bear some responsibility as does GWB, which was my point. The real responsibility for the slowness of recovery (although note that there has been recovery) is on the conservatives of both parties (and the Democrats have some) who refused to allow bold stimulus spending as advocated by economists such as Reich, Stieglitz and Krugman and instead insisted on withholding spending to avoid deficits and inflation. They were wrong but they had the political chops to get their way. That doesn’t make the problem Obama’s fault.
Jack,
“…Is totally ignored in your assessment of what the Trump voter is swayed by. ”
The title of this post is “Explaining Trump’s Appeal, Part 1.”
Mike, I should have added that it’s not too late to enact a meaningful stimulus but the political obstacles are likely to remain.
JackD,
You ignore Bill Clinton. The Reps were far more vicious toward him than toward Obama. Remember – before he became Presidents there were rumors that he personally killed a rival drug dealer at the Mena airport? By the second half of his term, Republican congresspeople were openly siding with self-declared enemies of the state peddling dubious facts (think Michigan Militia and the “jackbooted thugs” hearings). Eventually, they tried to impeach him. And yet, he got more done than Obama.
Another big difference…. this time around, the bulk of the siding with enemies of the state who accuse of government officials of being jackbooted thugs and who peddle dubious facts is being done by the President’s own allies,
Mike:
At what time did the Repubs ever meet together and determine before Clinton took office, they would actively oppose him? Obama biggest problem is he should have been a dick towards them and crammed his proposals down their throats while he had a majority. Funny thing with Blue dogs and Lieberman, you could never count on them.
Mike, I agree with your implied point: Clinton bears a lot of responsibility for what has happened since. He took credit for economic expansion that happened during his watch but really had nothing to do with his policies. Some stuff since, as you point out, did.
Why would Clinton have much of the blame?
Did he raise Fed rates to 6% shortly before 2001 and then crash them to save the 2001 economy? Did Clinton start the demise of Section 7 of Glass-Steagal which controlled how much money banks could invest on Wall Street? Did Clinton lead the change on the National Banking Act thereby allowing Citibank to absorb investment firms and insurance firms? Greenspan ring a bell or Gramm? Who opposed Brooksley Born when she tried to rein in the derivatives market? Wasn’t that Greenspan, Levitt, Rubin, and company? About the only thin Clinton did was sign the bill authorizing the repeal of Glass-Stegall and a change to the National Bank Act.
Probably the worst thing to happen was the death of State Usury Laws by SCOTUS and the consolidation of the credit card industry in South Dakota and Maryland(?).
JackD,
Every president bears some responsibility for what happens after they leave office since they set some chains of events in motion. But we judge Presidents based on what they did while in office. After they leave, its the responsibility of the next one to make things better by reversing the bad things and continuing and expanding the good things.
It is hard to see where Mr. Obama has reversed course on economic policies put in place by GW. It is even hard to see where he has tried. That’s on him, not on GW.
“Eventually, they tried to impeach him.”
They DID impeach him. (the Supremes essentially nullified Johnson’s impeachment when it overturn the law under which he was impeached.)
Mike,
Obama did get a stimulus and it did work. It wasn’t big enough and thus didn’t help as much as it could have but it did help. The economy and employment are indisputably better than when he took office. None of that, however, has addressed income disparity in the country.
Run,
If, thus far, anyone has accused Obsma of being a drug dealer who killed a rival with his own hands, I haven’t heard it. I first heard those rumors being peddled about Clinton before he took office. It was obvious he was in for a rough ride. There also hasn’t been an attempt to impeach him, or claims Obama was stealing Republican policies (despite the fact that Obama’s first term resembled GW’s second awfully closely when it came to economic policy). Sure, post Gingrich Republicans have been more open about being in opposition. On the other hand, support for Bundy was trivial, whereas the militia movement got a lot of friends and hearings in the Clinton admin. Put another way, actively opposing the existence of government was not seen as fringe by Republican congress people in the 1990s, and it is now.
Mike:
How does accusing someone of being a drug dealer match up to meeting pre-inauguration to determine a strategy of opposition throughout a President’s term? It doesn’t and this is precisely what happened with Obama. Frontline documents it; http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/the-republicans-plan-for-the-new-president/ as well as any number of publications. https://www.google.com/?gws_rd=ssl#q=republicans+met+before+obama+inauguration What happened with Clinton (or show me the meeting of the powers to be or what Senate leader said he would make Clinton a one term president) was name calling and casting of aspersions to discredit him and not openly block him. Bundy’s occupation and standing firm on grazing land is not the same as congressional opposition pre-planned to a President. A bit of a stretch on your part there Mike. But there was the Tea Bagger party who operationally opposed normal Repub practices and Dems.
What did Obama do to be impeached? Sign fewer executive orders than past presidents? Maybe being a Black man in The big White House?
PPACA got passed in his first term, Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, seated two female Justices on SCOTUS (and what about those Repubs blocking a last appt. where is the precedent for this?), ended “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”, assisted in the reorg of automotive, etc. How is this similar to GW Bush ?
I don’t think the economy has much to do with voting anymore. I think Nancy Pelosi is right when she says that working white guys vote on “guns, gays and god”. They have been listening to Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity for years, and they hate Democrats.
The economy is doing okay, the housing market has come back, the stock market is up. Any rational person would look at T.rump’s tax plan and understand that we working people will get screwed.
Several thoughts. I trust part 2 will address the racism, xenophobia, and religious intolerance of GOP appeal overall and Trump’s in particular. In my lifetime–since 1952–the Democrats have clearly done more for working people than the GOP. That is admittedlyt damning with faint praise but whenever anyone says there is no difference between the parties they are just plain wrong. I do not think the issue is GDP it is income and wealth distribution which becomes more important as growth slows. On that score I agree Obama did virtually nothing beyond the ACA to change the trend going back at least to Reagan. He has done a bit more in his second term but not nearly enough. To be fair he I think he would do more if he had Democrats controlling Congress and did not face the threat of the GOP blowing up the place if he pushed too hard and he has had to watch out for the courts just like FDR. Clinton will face the same restraints if she is elected president and I heard an interesting comment on the Senate yesterday that because the Democrats face a tough scenario in 2018 they are unlikely to move left even if they recapture the Senate in the fall. Does this mean that real tax reform will not happen regardless of outcome? Probably. Does this mean that real immigration reform will not happen regardless of outcome? Probably. Does this mean that an increase in the minimum wage will never get through Congress? Not sure about that one. I think that there could be some legislation to slightly strengthen Labor’s hand and perhaps some modest improvements in social welfare programs but not much unless it is a Democratic landslide or enough members of the GOP Congress get the memo that they will be kicked out at the next election if they do not do more than pay lip service to working people. Trump should be that memo but the GOP has not given any indication that they have gotten it, doubling down on the racism, xenophobia etc rather than the economic populism. When it comes to GDP I think Clinton can work with the GOP on some things where Obama could not like infrastructure rebuilding but that will not address income inequality and will do little to help working people do more than tread water. It also raises real sustainability questions to the extent GDP growth exceeds population growth and technological advance. Last point, I always thought that I was well off but it turns out that my family of 4, now 2 was only getting its per capita share of GDP. I do not feel so guilty anymore about being an oppressor of the masses.
Jim Hannan,
If you believe the economy is doing OK, either you didn’t look at the table, or you doubt the numbers, or you are defining OK as mediocre. I am doing fine, personally, but I still recognize that in the last 15 years, growth has been awful relative to equivalent periods from 1930 to 2000. We’d all be much better off if real GDP per capita had grown at 2% since 2000. For a lot people, better off would include dignity and stability that they don’t have now. That matters.
Perhaps the worst post to ever hit Angry Bear.
All of the problems with it have been clearly posted above.
Just sad.
EMichael
‘ever”? So you have read enough of the posts here to make such an evaluation? Did you have some sort of a rating system? or do you remember every post?
Are we to simply assume that your judgement is sound?
Or do you lack sound critical thinking skills to the degree that such a comment suggests? It follows too, I suppose, that you allow your emotions to rule your thoughts, anger or some deep complex regarding some shortcoming.
Or maybe you are truly just a superior being!
Ray,
Like most posts in here, mine was my opinion.
Don’t agree? Don’t.
BTW,
There is something very strange going on with some posters in here. Curious.
EMichael,
I am always curious
EMichael,
I bet you will be even more disappointed with Part 2.
“The title of this post is “Explaining Trump’s Appeal, Part 1.””
And by putting up a compendium of economic data you think that an explanation is in the offing? In the first place your chart displays economic growth forever. Not big growth, but also not regression. Also, as many a respected economist has noted, its not growth or no growth, its the distribution of the income generated by the economy that is the source of so much dissatisfaction. So if part one is meant to suggest that the Trump appeal is based on something to do with economic conditions, I would suggest that you have gotten the cart before the horse. His supporters are white, middle class/working class men. They’re not destitute by any chance. They may be getting the short end of the stick economically, but Trump hasn’t offered any bromides that would resolve their plight. And they have been voting for GOP capitalist hacks for about forty years now based on the GOP appeals to racism, and sundry social issues that have little to do with their economic plight. They vote their own economic disadvantage persistently in the name of god, against gay life style, abortion and segregation, including law and order.
Jack,
Apologies. As you say, simply putting up a compendium of data is not an explanation. Perhaps next time it will occur to me to include some verbage, perhaps stating something along these lines: “As the graphs shows, American real economic growth rates have been awful since the year 2000. The economy has performed worse than in any other comparable period since 1930, which includes the Great Depression. ”
I am, however, interested in this comment of yours: “Also, as many a respected economist has noted, its not growth or no growth, its the distribution of the income generated by the economy that is the source of so much dissatisfaction.” It seems to imply there would be satisfaction, despite mediocre growth, if only incomes were more equally distributed. I’m curious whether it also works if incomes go negative.
Also, it seems kind of odd to me. The U of Michigan Consumer Sentiment survey (http://www.sca.isr.umich.edu/files/chicsh.pdf) hit its lowest point just about the same time as the 1%’s share of total income also hit its low point (see first graph here: http://www.newyorker.com/rational-irrationality/american-inequality-in-six-charts). And of course, citing un-named but numerous respected economists beats data.
Terry,
I have a few follow-up posts in mind. Not every topic can be covered at once, at least not by me.
I suspect the government has underestimated GDP since 2000 because of the tech revolution. This is not new. Now the FED is looking in to see if they are under estimating industrial production due to the same IT factors. This really changed things in the 00’s.
Historically, the U-6 is moving into “normalization” mode. If by January 2020 it is 7%, then the expansion would have done the same as the 91-00 expansion did. Think about that for a sec.
I do not like the Trump voter: Typical Judeo fantasies mixed up with neo-liberalism. Boring and not working. That king of ‘whiteness’ does not interest me.
Remember about Abortion, if Men should have control on women, that want abortion, they should have control on women who DO NOT want abortion.
Mike,
Correlation is not causation.
Putting up the problems many americans have suffered over the last several decades on an economic basis does not mean this is why people are voting for Trump. It is not a coincidence that he dominated with the Rep Party, and now, a couple of days into the general election is falling apart.
As Jack said, these people that voted for Trump in the primaries have been voting GOP long before Donald Trump ever went into politics, or their parents voted for them. they are the John Birch Society, renamed, and come to the forefront with the same backers as teh John Birch Society. But the Kochs lost control.
You want to talk about economic populism, then Bernie Sanders is an example. Donald Trump is merely an example of the fact that half of the Rep base is composed of stone cold racists.
Before you come up with part 2, I need to ask you a question.
Do you think Trump won the Rep primary because of his economic policies and the differences between his policies(good luck figuring out what they are now, or will be in five minutes) and those of his opponents?
Cause I gotta tell you, I saw no real difference between his economic policies and his Rep primary opponents. Certainly none that were so substantial as to explain his primary win.
He won for one reason and one reason only, he was the biggest and loudest racist in the room. He caught his opponents thinking they could actually be racist and not say it outright (y’know, like the GOP has done for 50 years).
They got caught by surprise and were buried.
To talk about economic issues with a candidate who won the primary based on anything but economic issues is a waste of time.
Run,
I remember the Clinton admin as one where the Republicans made a show of acting like they were on the same team, but opposed the President wherever possible.
As to the policies you outlined, only PPACA is significant, and then, it basically amounts to Romney-care. The two Supreme Court Justices, well, let’s wait a few years and see if they’re a net positive to the country.
EMichael,
Trump has differed quite a lot from his Republican opponents. For one, he’s a protectionist. Concern that American workers didn’t get the short end of the stick in trade deals used to be a Democrat issue. The Democrats don’t talk about it any more, but Trump does.
Mike:
Continue to stick your head in the sand. Obama a black man in The Big White House was far different than how any president before him was treated. There was already a positive return which you choose to ignore, the slowing of the rise of healthcare costs. If you wish to fix the real cost, attack healthcare. Ahh, but than we must fix Congress.
As much as I oppose the TPP, the horses left the barn years ago.
It is all about patents and protections for corps. I hate it. But in terms of helping the American working class with its defeat, it means nothing.
Tax policies. Minimum wage. Union protection. Those are the big deals.
He is the same as the dirty dozen he ran against.
Just read this again.
” (despite the fact that Obama’s first term resembled GW’s second awfully closely when it came to economic policy). ”
Sorry, you should not be given the ability to spray this absolute bs on Angry Bear as a writer.
Want to make you points as a poster, knock yourself out.
The incredible stupidity and falseness of that claim should disqualify you from actually writing a thread in here.
WTF are you?
EMichael,
Call this a presponse:
http://angrybearblog.strategydemo.com/2011/04/why-i-will-not-be-voting-for-obama-in.html
Mike,
And that was a waste of time also.
Kinda weird I see no mention in there of Obama being President when marginal tax rates on the wealthiest Americans were raised more than 60%.
Now, I put that sentence together the correct way as opposed to saying Obama raised those taxes.
Let me know when you find where little george did something “awfully close” to that.
Watters vs. Wachovia
Dodd-Frank
This is not to say I agreed with all of Obama’s economic policies. Certainly were some of them I was against.
But whenever I hear another variation of “they are all the same”, I find it hard to listen to the people saying it. Mainly due to the history of the US the last 50 years.
Hmmmm! From your first reason not to vote for Obama:
” Economic growth/unemployment/taxes. These three topics, as Senator Ryan and all economists know, are closely inter-related.”
Which Senator Ryan was that? And why link him so closely with “all economists”? The man holds a baccalaureate from Miami University in Ohio. He was a devotee of Ayn Rand, a young lady embarrassed at her Jewish heritage changed her name, came to America and became a secondary script writer for Cecil B. DeMille. No, she had no specific academic training in the field of economics. In sum, Ryan is an economist in his mind only, yet you throw out his name first and foremost in your first reason not to vote for Obama.
Better yet you go on to imply that you can analyze the economic data better than Mr. Ryan and all those economists, and you start off with a reference to a quadratic relationship with data that at best implies an inverse relationship. In effect trying too hard to sound scientific with data that is dependent upon who it is that is accumulating that data. I’ll side with EMichael here and second the motion to reduce the number of inadequate posts that we’re all being subjected to. In this regard you are not in a class by yourself. And BTW, who the devil are you in favor of this time around? And if Obama wouldn’t do last time around that implies you were inclined towards Mitt, the I was borne on third and thought I had hit a home run in business guy. Yes, we are sorely lacking in talent and perspective at the top of the elites pile.