WASHINGTON (AP) – Seven months before facing a critical test from voters in the midterm elections, President Joe Biden is focusing on kitchen-table problems as he struggles to get credit for a restored economy.
Since Biden took office last year, job growth has been strong and steady – the March jobs report added 431,000 jobs and the unemployment rate fell to a low of 3.6%, he told the nation on Friday. But similar comments were also angered by his acknowledgment that food and gas prices are too high and that inflation is at an all-time low.
For Biden, the Americans’ insistence on the progress of the economic recovery serves as a major reminder of how far the country has come.
“Our economy has moved from prosperity to prosperity,” Biden said, even acknowledging that Americans are not ready to win. “I know this isn’t over: we need to do more to bring prices under control.”
At times, Biden’s bifurcated messaging – like the state of the economy – may seem like a shock to the conflict. This allows voters to gather their own opinions – for the potential political danger of a president.
Record wage gains of 5.6% over the past year, for example, against consumer prices, which grew 7.9% annually. Biden’s announcement last week that he plans to release one million barrels of oil a day from the US strategic reserve over the next six months was a recognition of the loss of inflation not only in the economy, but also in his own policy ambitions.
Biden’s position reflects economic discontent in opinion polls.
According to a March survey by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, 7 out of 10 people in the United States described the economy as bad, while nearly two-thirds denied Biden’s economic leadership.
Administration officials and Biden allies have happily pointed to job creation data as a sign of achievement, but they are also frustrated by the chronic economic turmoil that threatens him with a historically hospitable environment for the presidential party in the middle years.
They advised Biden to spotlight his work to bring down gas prices and the upcoming efforts to try to reduce the rise in food prices due to the war in Ukraine’s world bread basket.
He is not only focusing on the family budget. Biden’s latest message to voters is that he can control the country’s finances.
His annual budget request highlighted a বছরে 1 trillion deficit in 10 years, an attempt to claim a financial steward’s mantle, even driven by the expiration of the Covid-19 relief program, which is no longer necessary, and a new minimum tax on the country’s billionaires.
“Responsible financial accountability has always been a priority for voters,” said Democratic pollster John Anzalon, who suggested Biden’s 2020 campaign. “I think people want financial accountability. And I don’t think that has changed over the years. “
Biden’s colleagues also hope that he will be able to spend more time in other ways that the government is working to change the concrete in people’s lives with infrastructure investment and economic recovery.
Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the Democratic presidential nominee in 2016, said there was a “disconnection” between Biden’s legislation and the conduct of the war in Ukraine and the public’s understanding.
“I know for a fact that the midterms are always tough for the party in power, but we have a great story to tell,” he told NBC’s “Meet the Press” on Sunday. “There’s a lot of good work to be done on board and Democrats in and out of office. There’s a lot more work to be done to make the case.”
Correspondent Annie Coster, DNH, said Wednesday after meeting with Biden that her messages last month clearly targeted moderate voters.
Outside the White House, he said, “the state of the union was the spot in terms of what the elements of our districts, the purple districts, are talking about right now.” He noted Biden’s pivot in tackling mental health problems after the epidemic, as well as emphasizing that the president plans to run on infrastructure and job creation.
Voters described the epidemic, the recession, the explosion of government spending, the rapid recovery and inflation with pessimism.
The University of Michigan consumer sentiment survey includes a biased breakdown of numbers that shows growing concern among Democrats who need to turn to Biden in 2022. Democrats ‘expectations for the economy have been declining since July, while independents’ expectations for the economy. The lowest level since 2008 when the country was plunged into the Great Depression.
Oil and petrol prices are the drivers of this skepticism. Crude oil prices started the year at around $ 76 a barrel, rose to about $ 124 on March 8 after the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and seemed to stabilize just below $ 100 on Friday after announcing release from the Biden Reserve.
Desmond Lachman, a senior fellow at the Conservative American Enterprise Institute, called Biden’s response to the petroleum release “silent” and noted that “in the short term we are subject to the whims of external development, such as the Russian invasion.”
Justin Wolfers, an economist at the University of Michigan, whose work differs from the sentiment survey, noted that there is evidence that public perceptions of inflation may be worse than actual inflation. This is because petrol, food and other items where prices are openly displayed are the main drivers of high prices, perhaps giving an additional psychological effect to inflation.
The Ulfars have done academic work on the impact of oil prices on gubernatorial elections, but he noted that historical comparisons may not work after the financial and cultural impact of the epidemic, which has shaken expectations.
“If I were Biden, I’d use some version of ‘better than you did four years ago,'” Wolfers said. He said voters need to remember that by June 2020, when the world was gripped by an epidemic, the government was providing misleading information about the epidemic, the economy was in dire straits and “you don’t even know if you’re dying.”
“How do you feel now? That would be logical,” he said.
(Copyright (c) 2022 The Associated Press. All rights reserved
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