President Biden attempted to tackle a lot of different subjects in his annual State of the Union address on March 7, but among the most important of them was the state of the U.S. economy. The U.S. economy has achieved record-low unemployment, surprising GDP growth and the lowest inflation rate among all G7 major economies. Yet as conservative critics continue to argue the crisis of housing unaffordability and rising interest rates, many Americans have struggled with how they should feel about the complex economy as a whole.
Straight Arrow News contributor David Pakman reviews Biden’s speech and the results of a bipartisan CNN focus group that viewed it as well. Pakman argues that Biden made an effective argument about the positive outlook of the U.S. economy and that while elements of his speech could have been better, he certainly seems to have changed a number of minds. Pakman predicts Biden will win in November provided he can continue to communicate effectively about how well the economy is doing.
First of all, as a speech, Joe Biden’s speech was excellent. The criticisms were really about form. Some Republicans [were] so devastated by the fact that it worked to enlighten so many Americans about the state of the country, they resorted to alleging that Biden must have been on drugs and that’s how he got his energy, unable to really go after the substance of the speech. In terms of the substance, Joe Biden did a few different important things.
First of all, he effectively communicated that things are actually looking pretty good in the United States to a great degree. We know that most economic indicators look quite good, unemployment is low, inflation has come down, stock markets setting records seemingly all the time, GDP is doing well, wages are up, all of these different things. But public sentiment lags those indicators to a great degree. And one of the fascinating things was that CNN did a focus group before and after the speech. Before the speech, [viewers] in the low 40s believed the country was going in the right direction. After the speech, it went all the way up to the low 60s. That right there can win you an election in the sense that people vote based on how they perceive the country is doing.
And a lot of times when you ask people, “How are you doing?” They go, “I’m doing fine.” Then you say, “Well, how is the country doing?” They go, “Ehh it’s not going so well,” assuming that for other people, it’s not going well. And for some, of course, it’s not but overall, the economy is very solid. If you can move the percentage of people that think the country is going in the right direction from 42 to 62, that alone can win you reelection.