Talk:Economic policy of the first Donald Trump administration/Archive 2

Archive 1

Archive 2

Opening sentence

As it is now:

The economic policies of Donald Trump, which were outlined in his campaign pledges, include trade protectionism, immigration reduction, individual and corporate tax reform, repeal of the Dodd-Frank banking regulation,[1][2] and attempts to repeal the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act ("Obamacare").[3]

Adjustment suggestion, including tentative/future realignment of article title:

The economic policies of the Donald J. Trump administration—outlined in Trump's campaign pledges—include trade protectionism, immigration reduction, individual and corporate tax reform, dismantling the Dodd-Frank banking regulations,[1][2] and repeal of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act ("Obamacare").[3]

The implementation and outcomes of those pledges are separate, and not directly fleshed out in the remainder of the intro, specifically the failure to repeal Dodd-Frank (but changes to portions of it) and failure to repeal obamacare.

It may be instructive/informative to refer to the intro sentences of the other similar articles (and there is no article for George H.W. Bush's policies):

Reaganomics (/reɪɡəˈnɒmɪks/; a portmanteau of [Ronald] Reagan and economics attributed to Paul Harvey),[1] or Reaganism, refers to the economic policies promoted by U.S. President Ronald Reagan during the 1980s.

The economic policies of Bill Clinton, referred to by some as Clintonomics (a portmanteau of "Clinton" and "economics"), encapsulates the economic policies of United States President Bill Clinton that were implemented during his presidency, which lasted from January 1993 to January 2001.

The economic policy of the George W. Bush administration was characterized by significant income tax cuts in 2001 and 2003, the implementation of Medicare Part D in 2003, increased military spending for two wars, a housing bubble that contributed to the subprime mortgage crisis of 2007–2008, and the Great Recession that followed.

The economic policy of the Barack Obama administration was characterized by moderate tax increases on higher income Americans, designed to fund health care reform, reduce the federal budget deficit, and decrease income inequality. His first term (2009–2013) included measures designed to address the Great Recession and Subprime mortgage crisis, which began in 2007.

Anastrophe (talk) 23:07, 4 March 2020 (UTC)

I think we rewrite to cover what was actually done or attempted, rather than reference campaign pledges. Here is a thought:

The economic policy of the Donald Trump administration was characterized by individual and corporate tax cuts, attempts to repeal the Affordable Care Act, trade protectionism, immigration restriction, and deregulation focused on the energy and financial sectors.

Farcaster (talk) 00:28, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

This is a vast improvement over the existing version, I think I'll 'bold' it into the article now.

An aside - as I'm still gradually (excruciatingly gradually as time permits) working my way through the article - 'immigration restrictions' seems perhaps undue, considering the minimal coverage of it in the body. The immigration policy has been - well - the immigration policy, not an economic policy per se. But - that can be dealt with in due course. Anastrophe (talk) 03:25, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

I recommend "energy" be changed specifically to "fossil fuel" because windmills cause cancer and are useless. soibangla (talk) 18:27, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

Would it be possible for you to address these matters without adding snark, sarcasm, and crap unrelated to article improvement? Or were you suggesting we use those as references in article space? Not helpful. Anastrophe (talk) 18:59, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

Article rename

I brought this up in the section above entitled 'wordy'. It seem uncontroversial to rename the article from the current

• Economic policy of Donald Trump to
• Economic policy of the Donald Trump administration

...based upon the articles of the past three presidents. However, always wishing to avoid conflict, I figured I'd double check for consensus.

...urk! However, I just discovered after previewing this that Economic policy of the Donald Trump administration already exists as a redirect from that page being moved to this back in March 2017. Double urk. I've never moved an article, and fear fubaring it. Drilling down into the discussion (here at Immigration Policy of Donald Trump), it looks like it was swept up in a consensus vote that wasn't directly specific to this particular article. Anastrophe (talk) 23:19, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

I'm going to risk a revert and simply remove the text below the income inequality section. Since Trump has been on both sides of most issues his whole life, what he does while in office is the really ke information.Farcaster (talk) 06:59, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

Relativity... how about that?

I find this article extremely unfair. It is very biased and shows partisanship.

I only have ONE comment... how about you compare the global economic growth versus the US growth, first under Obama then under Trump. Here's why... you can't say that Obama did a better job than Trump cause during his time the whole world was on a climb. What is truly impressive with Trump is that he's ben able to keep nice growth while the rest of the world is actually struggling! But you don't talk about that do you? That's called manipulating numbers and information to your own good... which I believe in this case is you are trying to negatively affect Trump's positive work. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.68.28.125 (talk) 20:30, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

Relativity... how about that? Global GDP versus USA GDP... shows Trump is WAY better than Obama.

My sources: WORLD BANK https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.MKTP.KD.ZG?end=2017&start=2009 https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.MKTP.KD.ZG?end=2018&start=2017 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.68.28.125 (talk) 20:41, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

You showed some links but please look at WP:SYN and provide a reliable source.Manabimasu (talk) 15:50, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

Systemic bias banner

Some months ago assertions were made that this article is systematically biased, and a banner was placed at the top to reflect that concern. I repeatedly implored editors raising this concern to make edits to address it. I have seen little if any effort by editors to do this during the ensuing months. Consequently I recommend the banner be removed.soibangla (talk) 17:23, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

Agree.Farcaster (talk) 04:24, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Global GDP versus USA GDP

So here's the answer...

Under Obama, the USA and the World were having positive GDP growth. Yeah, that means anybody in office during that time would have done a good job.

Under Trump, the USA has a beautiful positive curb in GDP growth. During the same span the Global GDP was negative!

To anyone with some kind of intelligence, you see right away that Trump definitely has the better economic plan! It is easy for a president to show positive growth when the global growth is positive... my dog can do that. What is extremely incredible is how Trump was able to keep that positive growth going while the global growth was in the RED! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.68.28.125 (talk) 20:39, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

Do you have a reliable source?Manabimasu (talk) 15:49, 8 June 2020 (UTC)

In 2015, global GDP growth was significantly negative while American GDP growth was significantly positive. The latter also significantly beat the former in each of the preceding three years, indicating the American economy was beating the world economy for years before Trump. And the world economy includes the mammoth American economy, so subtracting the latter would make the remaining world GDP growth even weaker by comparison. See: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=rKzZ soibangla (talk) 17:12, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

Just looked and it appears that this isn't cited in the article, but I don't think it makes much sense to compare these two stats-- US has been driving growth for a long time now (that is, world growth depends on our growth more than the other way around) and even then they're surprisingly decoupled at times (what the hell happened in 2012?). And this source stopped counting world gdp in 2016 anyways, so it's not very useful even if it were a fruitful comparison. If we do an eyeball-average of just US growth, however, it looks like Trump has been keeping up a (very) slightly better rate of change (but due to take a hit in 2020 though, as with the rest of the world).Craneofthought (talk) 07:40, 9 October 2020 (UTC)

I think the point is that Trump has been saying America has the best economy in the world, as if this is a new development because of him, but it isn’t. soibangla (talk) 18:36, 9 October 2020 (UTC)

Stock Market

This page is seriously biased. There is no problem with talking about the fact that there are economist that have a negative view of Trumps economic policies, however there are also many well respected economist which believe that his policies had a great impact on the economy for the better. Why does this page not include these economist in the "Overall Evaluations" section, which talks about the overall evaluations of the Trump economy from 2017-2019? One of the things that I edited and was consistently taken down was my contribution about the stock market. This page says that the S&P 500 went up 45%, (which I believe is acutely 47%), during the first three years of the Trump Administration and it makes note that it went up 53% under Obama and 57% during Clinton after three years. Why do they mention Clinton and not Bush, which would make more since? The only reason I can think of is that they are trying to make Trump not look good. It doesn't mention the fact that the average rate of increase for the S&P 500 three years into a presidents term is 23% so Trumps gains are roughly double average, https://www.cnbc.com/2019/12/26/trumps-stock-market-rally-is-far-outpacing-past-us-presidents.html. They don't mention the fact that Trumps gains are significantly higher than the 22% achieved in the last three years of Obama, which I believe is a much more accurate comparison since it measures the rate at which it was going at right before Trump, not years before in a totally different economic climate. Its interesting to me that when it comes to Job creation they chose to use the last three years of Obama rather than the first three. However with the stock market they chose to use the first three years of Obama. I understand that it wouldn't be fair to blame Obama for his first three years in terms of job creation since the recession was not his fault. However if you are going to use the last three years of his presidency you have to be consistent when it comes to the different factors of the economy. I edited it and said that the Dow Jones Industrial Average in Trumps first three years increased by 49% vs 20% in the last three years of Obama. It had multiple sources which had the stock market closing dates from January 20th, 2014, 2017, and 2020 which backed up my claim. Despite this, Wikipedia chose to continuously revert it back to the original, and said I was cherry picking data. You are the ones cherry picking data, if you are taking data back from the Clinton presidency who's stock market gains are exceptional high. That does not portray an accurate picture of Trumps stock market gains. I would appreciate it if you would reconsider my edit. — Preceding unsigned comment added by JCITKOL (talk • contribs) 20:02, 28 September 2020 (UTC)

You may have good points, but your approach would've been better if you'd created your account yesterday and discussed your proposed major changes here first before executiong them. Your approach kinda triggers red flags of skepticism among folks who've been here awhile (the reason I know this is because I did the same thing on my first day, got into an edit war and was promptly blocked, lol). Anyway, the reason Trump's stock market is compared to Clinton and Obama is because the provided source does that in its text, although it does have a chart that shows GWB down 2.5%, so I'll add that. Generally, news sources treat the stock market as a horse race between presidents, so they start counting on inauguration day (or, sometimes improperly, on election day, at least in the case of Trump) so those are the sources we go with. But I agree that it's preferable to compare Obama's last three years to Trump's first three, as 2009 was an outlier, especially with job and wage growth, and last-three-to-first-three is more apples-apples. soibangla (talk) 21:50, 28 September 2020 (UTC)

Regarding overall bias: The true narrative (pre-coronavirus) is Trump inherited a strong economy from Obama that CBO said would hit full employment in 1-2 years if Obama policies continued. I suggest reading highlights of the CBO January 2017 budget & economic outlook, just prior to Trump's inauguration, if you are uncomfortable with that true narrative. Trump boosted deficits dramatically thereafter (+60% in 2018-2019 relative to Obama policy) to increase growth marginally, although job creation slowed under Trump.Farcaster (talk) 22:51, 28 September 2020 (UTC)

Regarding stock returns: Pros and cons of picking different comparisons. If you compare Obama's second term (starting January 1) with Trump's first term (starting January 20 through mid-September) and compare the number of trading days in common (919) their returns are equal at about 49%. Obama had a 30% return in 2013, the first year of his second term. If you take that out, yes Trump's first 3 years (2017-2019) are better than Obama's last 3 years (2014-2016). However, Trump cut corporate taxes by one-third (resulting in record stock buybacks), deregulated energy/environment somewhat, and boosted deficits dramatically. These are serious costs to boost Trump's stock market returns. In contrast, Obama raised taxes on the top 1%, cut deficits, and continued regulating in his second term. That context is important.Farcaster (talk) 22:51, 28 September 2020 (UTC)

I understand what your saying and I appreciate that you put the Bush statistic in there as well. My main problem with this page, is I feel it creates a false image of what the economic situation is. The fact is that this page fails to mention that there are many economist which believe that Trumps policies have had a positive impact on the economy. And you mentioned the CBO, its worth noting that the economy has outperformed what the CBO projected, which even this page admitted. There are also many factors that have significantly improved under Trump, for instance manufacturing which saw half a million new jobs in his first three years, significantly more than the previous three, matter fact we lost 7,000 manufacturing jobs in 2016, the year before Trump took office. This article explains it well. https://www.wsj.com/articles/remember-the-trump-economy-11598396570 — Preceding unsigned comment added by JCITKOL (talk • contribs) 23:30, 28 September 2020 (UTC)

@JCITKOL: If you could give us some well-cited examples of economists who believe that Trump policies have had a positive effect, that would help us discuss the matter further. WikiDan61^ChatMe!_ReadMe!! 00:24, 29 September 2020 (UTC)

Well, you need to dig a little deeper. The primary reason manufacturing jobs were weak in 2016 was because the oil/gas drilling equipment sector in Texas/Oklahoma was in a slump due to lower oil prices, due to Obama waiving the 40 year-old oil export ban in 2014, followed by Congress repealing it in 2015, causing oil (and gasoline) prices to plummet, which was good for everyone driving a internal combustion vehicle, but not good for the oil business. Then oil prices increased under Trump, so those jobs came back. But then his tariffs increased manufacturing costs, so manufacturers put spending/hiring on hold to see what the outcome would be, causing manufacturing employment to flatline all through 2019. Contrary to what many believe, 2010-2015 saw the best-sustained manufacturing job creation since the 1970s. When Obama said "some of those jobs aren't coming back" (from other countries, not generally) in June 2016, 898k manufacturing jobs had been created over the preceding 75 months. Also, WSJ editorials don't count. soibangla (talk) 00:53, 29 September 2020 (UTC)

Why did Manufacturing jobs start going up right after the election in 2016? Are you saying that had nothing to do with trump? And Why don't WSJ editorials count? — Preceding unsigned comment added by JCITKOL (talk • contribs) 15:18, 29 September 2020 (UTC)

@JCITKOL: Why did manufacturing jobs start going up right after the 2016 election? Trump was not yet in office, so attributing that rise to him might be difficult. But if you can find a reliable source to say so, please do. I don't know that I'd 100% agree with Soibangla that Wall Street Journal editorials "don't count", but they need to be evaluated for their neutrality. The WSJ news pages are reliably factual, but their editorials tend to be overtly in favor of President Trump. (For the same reason, I'd avoid relying on Washington Post editorials, as they would tend to be anti-Trump.) In general, editorials can be cited as expressing an opinion (e.g. John Doe, writing in a Wall Street Journal editorial, says "blah".), but should not be cited as expressing facts. WikiDan61^ChatMe!_ReadMe!! 15:28, 29 September 2020 (UTC)

Data fluctuate. From WSJ: In July 2020, more than 280 Journal journalists and Dow Jones staff members wrote a letter to new publisher Almar Latour to criticize the opinion pages' "lack of fact-checking and transparency, and its apparent disregard for evidence," adding, "opinion articles often make assertions that are contradicted by WSJ reporting." The editorial board responded that its opinion pages “won’t wilt under cancel-culture pressure” and that the objective of the editorial content is to be independent of the Journal's news content and offer alternative views to "the uniform progressive views that dominate nearly all of today’s media." The board’s response did not address issues regarding fact-checking that had been raised in the letter. soibangla (talk) 17:56, 29 September 2020 (UTC)

I think you can absolutely attribute the rise in Manufacturing after the election to Trump. In 2016 we were losing manufacturing jobs by the thousands and you mean to tell me all of a sudden it starts going up after the election? They knew that Trumps policies were more friendly to manufacturers. And whats really ridiculous is this. First of wall, the Wall Street journal is a highly respected source. There are 2 OPINION pieces in the "Overall Evaluations" section from the New York Times, who's editorial board is very left leaning, and then you say you cant have editorials. Thats ridiculous. Its only fair to include a broader, more balanced view of how economist view Trump. Not just the economist which fit the liberal narrative. — Preceding unsigned comment added by JCITKOL (talk • contribs) 21:24, 29 September 2020 (UTC)

the Wall Street journal is a highly respected source. Yes, their news division is excellent and I frequenty cite them. But they appear to stand alone or nearly alone among major metropolitan broadsheet newspapers in their lax to nonexistent fact-checking in their opinion pages, and as I just showed, when their reporters asked the board to fact-check, it was brushed-off as a demand for "cancel culture." NYT fact-checks their opinion page pieces, notwithstanding a recent episode in which that process failed to catch errors in a major piece, and a senior editor was fired for it, demonstrating that they take it seriously. In any event, I encourage you to provide reliable sources to show that manufacturing jobs increased due to Trump's policies, rather than a resumption of a long-term trend. The fact that Trump has falsely asserted 360+ times that he has the best economy ever might lead some to actually believe it. soibangla (talk) 22:00, 29 September 2020 (UTC)

@JCITKOL: Re: I think you can absolutely attribute the rise in Manufacturing after the election to Trump. Not to sound rude, but what you think doesn't really matter here. Nor does what I think. What matters is what reliable sources say. Find a reliable, unbiased source that attributes the growth in manufacturing jobs in November 2016 to the Trump election, and we can discuss the matter further. Until you can find such a source, we have nothing to discuss. WikiDan61^ChatMe!_ReadMe!! 11:34, 30 September 2020 (UTC)

https://www.forbes.com/sites/chuckdevore/2019/07/10/in-trumps-first-30-months-manufacturing-up-by-314000-jobs-over-obama-what-states-are-hot/#8a99b362677b — Preceding unsigned comment added by JCITKOL (talk • contribs) 04:53, 30 October 2020 (UTC)

Btw, this is not related to manufacturing, but the S&P 500 was up 47% in Trumps first three years, not 45%, and I still think its unfair to compare the stock market in the first three years of Obama to the first three years of Trump considering the fact that Obama came in at the bottom right after the stock market crashed. In the first three years of the Trump administration, the S&P 500 went up at a 114% faster rate than it did in the previous three years. The Dow went up at an 145% faster rate, and NASDAQ went up at an 116% faster rate. I still think thats a much fairer comparison. Also on the topic of Job Creation, this page says, "Discussing the economy on July 27, 2018, Trump stated, "We have added 3.7 million new jobs since the election, a number that is unthinkable if you go back to the campaign. Nobody would have said it." While this figure was accurate for the 19 months following the election, during the 19 months prior to the election, 3.9 million jobs were created.[239]" What Trump said is absolutely true. While it is true that Job creation was faster at the end of Obama. The CBO projected actually a much bigger slowdown. In the first three years of the Trump administration. Job creation was over 300% faster than projected by the CBO. These things need to be edited. — Preceding unsigned comment added by JCITKOL (talk • contribs) 05:04, 30 October 2020 (UTC)

Obama did not come in at the bottom, when he came in the market was still in freefall and did not bottom until March. And while one can argue that he benefitted from a bounceback from that bottom, that argument is valid only until perhaps early 2010, because the market continued to rise for years, even after the bounceback was long over. As far as jobs are concerned, what the CBO projected is notable (and noted in the article) but what actually happened is far more notable. soibangla (talk) 18:05, 30 October 2020 (UTC)

The stock market (Dow Jones) went up at an 145% faster rate in the first three years of the trump administration than in the last three years of Obama. Thats a fact. Trump is right to say that 3.7 million jobs is an incredible number. CBO projected a much bigger slowdown. Totally misleading. And once again the the S&P 500 went up 47%, not 45% in the first three years of Trump. That needs to be edited. — Preceding unsigned comment added by JCITKOL (talk • contribs) 19:34, 30 October 2020 (UTC)

As I stated previously: Generally, news sources treat the stock market as a horse race between presidents, so they start counting on inauguration day (or, sometimes improperly, on election day, at least in the case of Trump) so those are the sources we go with. Like so: https://www.macrotrends.net/2481/stock-market-performance-by-president soibangla (talk) 23:01, 30 October 2020 (UTC)

Ok, but its 47% not 45%, and the part about job creation is misleading. — Preceding unsigned comment added by JCITKOL (talk • contribs) 01:16, 31 October 2020 (UTC)

Current level vs inauguration

There is incorrect information here. As of November 2020 there were 10.7 million people unemployed, not 12.6. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/UNEMPLOY — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.80.134.229 (talk) 06:09, 5 January 2021 (UTC)

Thank you, corrections made.Farcaster (talk) 06:38, 5 January 2021 (UTC)

PLAGIRISM AND PARTISANSHIP

05:43, 13 February 2021 (UTC)05:43, 13 February 2021 (UTC)~~"Despite a campaign promise to eliminate the national debt in eight years, Trump as president approved large increases in government spending, as well as the 2017 tax cut. As a result, the federal budget deficit increased by almost 50%, to nearly $1 trillion in 2019.[284] Under Trump, the U.S. national debt increased by 39%, reaching $27.75 trillion by the end of his term; the U.S. debt-to-GDP ratio also hit a post-World War II high.[285]

Although the U.S. unemployment rate hit a 50-year low (3.5%) in February 2020, the unemployment rate hit a 90-year high (14.7%), matching Great Depression levels, just two months later, due to the COVID-19 pandemic.[286] Trump left office with 3 million fewer jobs in the U.S. than when he took office, making Trump the only modern U.S. president to leave office with a smaller workforce.[269]"

This is outright plagiarism from Donald Trump's main wikipedia page. Look it up. My edit about the fact that by the fact that when Trump left office, the stock market was at a record high, and the unemployment rate went from the highest level since the Great Depression to 6.3%, which is just slightly higher than historical average, was deleted, as usual, partisan administrators took it down despite the fact that everything I wrote was properly sourced. They replaced it with plagiarism. NOT FAIR!! — Preceding unsigned comment added by JCITKOL (talk • contribs) 05:43, 13 February 2021 (UTC)

• Content may be imported from one article to another. Wikipedia:Copying within Wikipedia. Neutrality^talk 06:03, 13 February 2021 (UTC)

But why was my content deleted?????? — Preceding unsigned comment added by JCITKOL (talk • contribs) 06:06, 13 February 2021 (UTC)

• What, specifically, are you talking about? The stock market is already addressed in the article. Neutrality^talk 06:15, 13 February 2021 (UTC)

That wasn't all I talked about. Here is what I said (roughly). "The pandemic and the subsequent shutdowns caused the stock market to crash, as well as the loss of over 22 million jobs, with the unemployment rate rising to 14.8%, within two months. However by the end of his term, more than 12 million jobs were restored, the unemployment rate was reduced significantly to 6.3%, and the stock market was at record high, soaring past pre pandemic levels.

There is no reason I can think of for that to be deleted. It was then replaced with,

"The U.S. unemployment rate, which had hit a 50-year low (3.5%) in February 2020, hit a 90-year high (14.7%) just two months later, matching Great Depression levels. Trump left office with 3 million fewer jobs in the U.S. than when he took office, making Trump the only modern U.S. president to leave office with a smaller workforce.[10]

Despite a campaign promise to eliminate the national debt in eight years, Trump as president approved large increases in government spending, as well as the 2017 tax cut. As a result, the federal budget deficit increased by almost 50%, to nearly $1 trillion in 2019.[16] Under Trump, the U.S. national debt increased by 39%, reaching $27.75 trillion by the end of his term; the U.S. debt-to-GDP ratio also hit a post-World War II high.[17]"

References

Blatant lies or extreme misleading at best

"Trump presided over the slowest economic growth of any U.S. president since the Second World War." at the very top of a crucial paragraph.

Really? Trump had an avarege of 2.5 (excluding the last - Covid year) while Obama scored 2.2 avarage (excluding his first year in the minus - would be even lower).

This article need to be rewritten using reliable and unbiased sources. There is so many of this biased junk and unreliable sources. 188.112.82.24 (talk) 20:36, 2 July 2022 (UTC)