Harris will carry Biden’s record into election
WASHINGTON — A key question is looming for Vice President Kamala Harris as she edges closer to gaining the Democratic presidential nomination: Can she turn the Biden-Harris economic record into a political advantage in a way that President Joe Biden failed to do?
In some ways, her task would seem straightforward: The administration oversaw a vigorous rebound from the pandemic recession, one that shrank the US unemployment rate to a half-century low of 3.4% in early 2023 — far below the painful 6.4% rate when Biden and Harris took office in 2021. The rate stayed below 4% for more than two years, the longest such stretch since the 1960s.
Boosted by the administration’s $1.9 trillion stimulus package, robust economic growth sent demand for workers soaring, forcing employers to jack up wages. Paychecks rose particularly fast for lower-paid workers, thereby narrowing income inequality.
Soon, though, clogged supply chains caused parts shortages, as demand for furniture, cars, and other goods, juiced by the administration’s stimulus, soared. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine escalated gas and food prices. In June 2022, inflation reached a four-decade high.
The spike in prices was so severe that it offset most of the wage growth that workers had enjoyed. And it soured Americans on the economy. Consumer sentiment plunged in late 2021 and has barely recovered even as inflation has plummeted from 9.1% in 2022 to 3%.
A wide gap has opened up between the public’s dim view of the economy and the generally positive data on jobs, falling inflation and economic growth. Chris Jackson, head of polling at Ipsos Public Affairs, said he blames the cumulative jump in average prices over the past three years — roughly 20%, only partly offset by higher paychecks — and a general unease about the country’s direction.
“People are, generally speaking, doing OK,” Jackson said. “They have their jobs, they’re getting paid, they’ve seen pay raises — all those sort of things. And yet they don’t feel like their dollars go as far. They feel like the country is not going in a good direction, just in general.”