At The Republican National Convention, All Eyes Will Be On Trump’s Economic Record

As the Republican Convention opens I expect President Trump will make the case he is best positioned to end the recession. According to Yale professor Ray Fair’s predictive voting model, the incumbent party usually wins if the economy does better in the year of the election. Unfortunately for the Republican party, Trump may have sunk his reelection because he ignored advice from professional economists.

Trump ignored economists who advised him that corporate tax cuts would not be enough to induce investment or induce firms to raise pay. Trump ignored economists’ consensus that tariffs would create higher prices and retaliation. And Trump ignored economists on how to reopen the economy during Covid-19. As a result, we have more deaths, more unemployment and more closed schools than other rich nations.