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Remember The Eggs, Donald

Published by digby on February 19, 2025

It isn’t his fault though, naturally. Nothing ever is.

But people aren’t buying it. He promised to fix it on day one:

A pillar of Trump’s political strength has been public belief that his policies will be good for the economy, and his rating on the economy remains significantly higher than the final readings of his predecessor in office, Democrat Joe Biden, who ended his term with a 34% approval rating on the economy. But Trump’s rating for the economy is well below the 53% he had in Reuters/Ipsos polling conducted in February 2017, the first full month of his first term as U.S. president.

In the latest poll, only 32% of respondents approved of Trump’s performance on inflation, a potential early sign of disappointment in the Republican’s performance on a core economic issue after several years of rising prices weakened Biden ahead of last year’s presidential election. Trump defeated Biden’s vice president, Kamala Harris, in the Electoral College and narrowly won the popular vote.

Fifty-four percent of respondents in the latest Reuters/Ipsos poll said they opposed new tariffs on imported goods from other countries, while 41% were in favor of them. Increasing tariffs on Chinese goods had higher levels of support, with 49% in favor and 47% against.

It’s likely to get a whole lot worse. Economist Jesse Rothstein has some bad news:

It seems almost unavoidable at this point that we are headed for a deep, deep recession. Just based on 200K+ federal firings & pullback of contracts, the March employment report (to be released April 4) seems certain to show bigger job losses than any month ever outside of a few in 2008-9 and 2020.

— Jesse Rothstein (@jrothst.bsky.social) 2025-02-19T01:37:08.298Z

Add on to that enormous private market uncertainty – how could you hire in these conditions? – and this is going to be very, very bad.

— Jesse Rothstein (@jrothst.bsky.social) 2025-02-19T01:37:08.299Z

To be clear: Even greater damage will be done by the loss of federal government productivity. The workers who are losing their jobs were worth more than they were being paid! We are all poorer when roads, planes, and food are unsafe, when parks are closed, etc.

— Jesse Rothstein (@jrothst.bsky.social) 2025-02-19T01:37:08.300Z

That’s not even talking about the effects of the tariffs and the deportations.

But don’t worry, at least we won’t have to put up with DEI at the FAA anymore. I’m sure it will all be worth it.

Update — I should have added this:

Note that approval of his economic stewardship is lower than it ever was in the first term and it’s sinking fast. That’s an alarm bell that he doesn’t seem to be hearing.

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