Kamala Harris Is Breaking Through on the Economy

The vice president has narrowed the gap with Donald Trump on who voters think is better for the economy and their personal finances

VP Kamala Harris’ economic agenda is resonating. “I promise you, I will be pragmatic in my approach,” she said Wednesday in Pittsburgh. (Photo by Jeff Swensen via Getty Images)

Since World War II, Democratic presidents have overseen significantly stronger job creation and overall rates of growth than Republican presidents. In contrast, Republicans have been in office during each of the last five recessions, including Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, George W. Bush (twice) and Donald Trump.

This is no mere coincidence, notes economist Jeffrey Frankel at Harvard University’s Kennedy School. “A remarkable 9 of the last 10 recessions have started when a Republican was president,” he wrote earlier this year. “The odds that this outcome would have occurred just by chance are even more remote: one out of 100.”

You might have heard former President Bill Clinton’s surprising discovery on job creation during the Democratic National Convention last month. “You’re going to have a hard time believing this, but so help me, I triple-checked it,” Clinton told the crowd. “Since the end of the Cold War in 1989, America has created about 51 million new jobs. I swear I checked this three times. Even I couldn’t believe it. What’s the score? Democrats 50, Republicans one.”

Yet despite facts like these, Republicans consistently score higher among voters as stewards of the economy than Democrats—as if their pro-business, anti-union, anti-regulation, low-tax agendas translate into better economic results for the country. That fiction has fueled such utterly failed policies as trickle-down economics and race-to-the-bottom state pursuits to implement low or no income taxes.

The assumption that Republicans are better for the economy has also aided Donald Trump, despite his six bankruptcies, plenty of failed businesses and reliance on inherited wealth. Despite his economic failures as president accelerated by his incompetent response to the pandemic—low growth rate, loss of jobs, the largest expansion of national debt fueled by his tax cuts to the wealthiest Americans—many Americans were still giving him high marks earlier this year. Meanwhile, Trump has been blaming high inflation and rising living costs—a global phenomenon—on President Joe Biden. An April poll found that six out of ten Americans believed Trump was better for the country on job creation and cost of living.

This historical myth has been a serious headwind facing the emergent campaign of Kamala Harris. In fact, in a March poll, Trump was riding a 15-point advantage over Biden on the issue of who can better manage the economy. An earlier poll, in January, gave Trump a stunning 22-point advantage.

But not anymore. A remarkable thing is happening. Republicans’ traditional advantage on handling the economy is shrinking significantly. VP Harris has shrunk that gap to an average of six points, according to five recent polls.

Despite the continuing noise by media pundits that Harris has failed to provide sufficient policy specifics—and complaints that she only emphasizes her personal biography coming from a struggling middle-class family—her focus on middle-class Americans, housing, affordable health care, child care and tax breaks for small businesses is having a real effect. Trump’s false claims that heavy tariffs and more tax cuts for businesses and deregulation will make lives better for ordinary Americans is also helping Harris make her case.

“His agenda would weaken the economy and hurt working people and the middle class,” she said Wednesday during an economic speech hosted by the Economic Club of Pittsburgh. “You see for Donald Trump, our economy works best if it works for those who own the big skyscrapers, not those who actually build them, not those who wire them, not those who mop the floors.”

She reiterated that the building of a strong middle class is “a defining goal of my presidency…just common sense…actually what works.” Then she took the moment to indirectly address Trump’s attempts to label her a communist or a Marxist—you know, all that foolish talk of “Comrade Harris.” It was refreshing—and I think worth reading in full:

The American economy is the most powerful force for innovation and wealth creation in human history. We just need to move past the failed policies that we have proven don’t work. And like generations before us, let us be inspired by what is possible. As President, I will be grounded in my fundamental values of fairness, dignity and opportunity.

And I promise you, I will be pragmatic in my approach. I will engage in what Franklin Roosevelt called bold, persistent experimentation, because I believe we shouldn’t be constrained by ideology and instead should seek practical solutions to problems. Realistic assessments of what is working and what is not. Applying metrics to our analysis. Applying facts to our analysis, and stay focused then, not only on the crises at hand, but on our big goals. On what’s best for America over the long term. And part of being pragmatic means taking good ideas from wherever they come.

To be sure, the newly assertive pragmatist also made a point of characterizing herself as a capitalist who believes in free and fair markets and “consistent and transparent rules of the road to create a stable business environment.” (No wonder more than 90 prominent business leaders have endorsed her this month, as well as over 400 economists and high-ranking officials emphasizing her plans to build a “strong, pro-growth economy for all Americans.”)

In addition to detailing her policy plans, Harris also highlighted a Financial Times and University of Chicago survey of nearly 40 top economists, in which 70 percent said Trump’s economic plans would be more likely to spur inflation and result in larger federal deficits. Only three percent said they believe Harris’ agenda would be more inflationary.

The narrowing of the gap on who voters think can better handle the economy—particularly meaningful because the economy typically ranks at or near the top of voters’ concerns—may not be over. That’s in part because Americans have begun to feel more positive about the economy, as inflation has cooled, interest rates have been cut, the cost of gas is down and other prices are stabilizing.

That’s not just my view. A new consumer survey from the University of Michigan has found that consumer sentiment about the economy, inflation and personal finances is up 40 percent from its low in June 2022. And these increasingly positive views are also influencing consumers’ expectations about the election.

Not only did a strong majority of respondents say they expected Harris to win the election over Trump (58 to 34 percent), Harris was seen as better for the economy (41 to 38 percent) and tied on the issue of who’s better for personal finances (at 37 percent).

Interestingly, the numbers are strongest for Harris among those who are 65 or older. That is, 48 to 39 percent think she is the better candidate for the economy and 45 to 38 percent say she is better for personal finances.

Not only may this be the election when Americans overwhelmingly assert that they choose democracy over fascism, but also that they believe it’s a Democrat who represents the winning agenda for a healthy economy. Maybe—finally—factual reality can reassert itself. Isn’t that a beautiful thought?

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