Would Trump or Biden Be Better for Economy?

During Donald Trump’s term in office, the Marquette Poll asked voters to rate his handling of the economy. The response was remarkably stable over this time. An average of 52% said they strongly or somewhat approved of his handling, while 46% said they strongly or somewhat disapproved.

Ratings for Joe Biden were considerably more negative. In early August of 2021, a slight plurality of voters disapproved of Biden’s handling of the economy by a ratio of 48% to 46%. Three months later, the response grew substantially more negative, with only 39% approving compared to 56% who said they strongly or somewhat disapproved.

The same pattern held in a series of three polls between last November and April of this year. These asked a sample of likely voters whether they thought that Biden or Trump would do a better job of handling the economy. The responses were consistent from one poll to another: 35% chose Biden compared to 52% choosing Trump. (6% said they both were about the same, with 6% saying that neither was good.)

Both Biden and Trump have served one term as president. I looked at job growth during their terms as a measure of the strength of their economies.

However, Trump’s final year was dominated by the COVID-19 pandemic. Although one may criticize some of his actions in response, such as his support for unproven remedies and his mixed messages on masking, the fact remains that he was not responsible for the pandemic and its impact on the economy. Thus, I chose to look at job growth over the first three years of his term.

Sticking with the three-year term model, I used the most recent years of Biden’s term. This had the advantage of avoiding having to adjust for different time periods. For job data for the US this meant looking at job growth between May 2021 and May 2024 for Biden. For Wisconsin, the period ran from April 2021 to April 2024 for Biden, since May job data has not yet been released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The graph above shows the number in thousands of jobs in the US at the start of each president’s three-year time period, on the left, and the end, shown on the right. Coincidentally, both terms start with almost the same number of jobs. This reflects job loss because of the pandemic. The results show jobs grew by 5,938 under Trump and by 12,097 jobs under Biden.

This next graph (above) shows job growth in Wisconsin during the same periods. At the start of Trump’s term, there were about 2.94 million jobs in Wisconsin, which grew to 2.99 just before Covid hit. In April 2021, Wisconsin had 2.88 million jobs, which grew to 3.04 million in April 2024. So Wisconsin jobs grew by 53 under Trump and by 158, nearly triple the number under Biden.

The next graph summarizes the results. During the Trump period, jobs grew by about 4.82% in the U.S., compared to a 9.82% growth in the Biden period. Wisconsin jobs grew 1.79% under Trump compared to 5.5% under Biden.

The differing job growth strategies adopted by the Trump and Biden presidential administrations nicely reflect the philosophical differences between the two parties. At least since the early 1980s Republican doctrine says that the way to create jobs is to reduce taxes, particularly taxes on wealthy people and corporations.

]Thus, Trump’s one big legislative accomplishment during his first three years in office was passage of the so-called Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA), which was heavily weighted to reduce taxes on wealthy Americans. An analysis by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimated this legislation added $1.8 trillion to the federal deficit. Current indications are that the Trump team plans to expand the TCJA if he is elected.

Rather than single out a key to prosperity, the Biden presidency concentrates on developing pragmatic solutions to problems, upgrading infrastructure, investing in renewable energy, supporting cutting-edge technology (like the Chips act), and strengthening the nation’s safety net. The approach follows a long tradition of Democratic governance, dating at least from the New Deal.

A look at job growth during each man’s presidency makes clear which approach better serves the economy.