Trump’s Numbers, Second Term
On Jan. 20 -- the one-year anniversary of President Donald Trump's return to office -- we published our first “Trump’s Numbers” article of his second term. These reports, which provide various statistical measures of how the country has changed under the president, are a regular feature we first launched back in 2012.
The report was written by three staffers and our two former directors, who still occasionally write for us. For our "numbers" series, we wait a year when a new president is inaugurated to allow for the accumulation of some data. Going forward, we'll provide quarterly updates.
Over Trump's (second) first year:
- Job growth slowed, and the unemployment rate crept upward. Job-seekers now outnumber job openings.
- Price increases slowed according to the most commonly watched number. But they worsened according to the measure preferred by the Federal Reserve.
- Paychecks grew faster than inflation. Real weekly earnings of private-sector workers rose 1.4%.
- Economists estimate the economy grew 1.8%.
- Consumer sentiment declined.
- The number of apprehensions at the U.S. border with Mexico decreased 91.4%, while refugee admissions declined 98%.
- The international trade deficit decreased only slightly, by 0.9%.
- The stock market continued to set new records.
That's just some of the information in our article, which aims to simply provide the numbers -- not to fact-check specific claims. The figures may be expected or surprising, good or bad, depending on one’s point of view. We leave those opinions to readers, and we make no judgments as to how much credit or blame a president deserves for these measures.
Read the full story: "Trump’s Numbers, Second Term."
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