RICK KLEIN: There is a big split right now between the metrics
of the economy and the reality as it's
being felt by Americans.
You have some outward signs that say that things
should be pretty good.
And yet, they're not for so many Americans.
REPORTER: How do you feel about the economy right now?
It's gone down.
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Let's begin by taking stock of where
the American economy is today.
The unemployment rate is about 3.8%.
The GDP growth is about 2.2%.
Now, if you look at those numbers
and looked at them in isolation, you would say,
whoa, the economy is doing pretty good.
Of course, when you look at the polling, that's not the answer.
Americans feel pretty down about the economy.
And specifically, they feel quite down
about President Biden's handling of the economy.
Almost half of Americans feel like their lives have
gotten worse economically since the start
of the Biden administration.
Today-- it's not hyperbole-- we have the strongest
economy in the world.
And you're looking at me a little skeptical.
But I promise you.
Check it out.
GALEN DRUKE: Over time, perceptions of the economy
have become less tied to the actual economic performance.
And that's because partisanship has increased.
Housing has increased.
Interest rate has gone up.
RICK KLEIN: So we haven't seen a real overall approach
from any of the candidates frankly
that reflects the reality of governing
in 2023, 2024, and beyond.
The fact that prices are as high as they
are, the sense that wages haven't kept up.
You also have a series of strikes going on.
You also have a looming and growing debt crisis
when you talk about how much debt the federal government is
racking up and has racked up now for decades under
Democratic and Republican rule.
This is a fight for the UAW, for my brothers
and sisters that should be getting paid of livable wage.
I would love to be a homeowner once I reach 30.
But with the economy, I'm not sure if that's going to happen.
GALEN DRUKE: Before the pandemic,
we had low levels of inflation for, like,
decades at that point.
And so in response to this crisis,
there's a massive amount of stimulus that
is pumped into the economy.
Essentially, it's the CARES Act, which is over $2 trillion,
in March.
There's another stimulus package that's almost $1 trillion
that's passed in December.
A democratically controlled government in Washington
passes that $2 trillion stimulus.
So now the stimulus has totaled more than $5 trillion.
And economists start warning folks,
this may be too much stimulus.
So we see inflation rise to a place
that we haven't seen in American life since the '70s or '80s.
So now what happens?
The Fed stops printing cash.
They start raising interest rates at the fastest level
also in decades.
Inflation does start to go down.
But if you have a mindset of when you experience
9% inflation annually, but then, oh, the next year inflation
is only 4%, in your mind, you're still paying 13% more
than you were two years earlier, that while wages were rising
throughout that period, they were not rising
at the same rate as prices.
So for a majority of Americans, they
were literally getting poorer.
So there's a big disconnect, though,
between the numbers and the realities as people feel it.
And that, I think, is fueling part of the uncertainty
is that you can show people that things are good.
But if they don't feel it, and they haven't felt it to date,
it's a very hard political argument to make.
Until or unless people feel better about the economy,
it will be an overriding issue.
So this is a time, I think, of political uncertainty
that matches the economic.
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