US economic performance under Trump mapped in charts: successes, turmoil and setbacks
Despite president’s claims of an economic boom, picture is chaotic – healthy GDP growth but weak jobs figures
According to Donald Trump’s White House, the US economy is on fire, inflation has been vanquished and employment is skyrocketing. Yet in recent days a cascade of official data has undercut that triumphant narrative.
This week’s reports on Trump’s first six months in office paint a picture that is part good, part crazy and part ugly. While GDP headlines trumpet robust expansion, trade figures swing wildly and the labor market shows clear signs of cooling. Over the past half-year, Trump has waged an unprecedented campaign to reshape global trade—threatening and imposing heavy tariffs on allies and rivals alike in an effort to extract concessions.
Relatively Resilient Growth
At first glance, the standout takeaway is that the economy rebounded in the second quarter. Gross domestic product—the broadest gauge of economic health—grew at its fastest pace since last summer, snapping out of a surprise contraction in the first quarter. But that rebound conceals a sharp 15.6 percent plunge in private domestic investment as businesses struggled to adjust to whipsaw policy shifts. And when measured over the first half of the year, growth amounted to a mere 1.2 percent—so modest that The Wall Street Journal labeled it “the weirdest GDP report ever.”
Imports surge and plunge
Digging deeper reveals how Trump’s tariff threats have upended trade flows. In the first quarter, companies stockpiled goods ahead of looming levies, triggering an unprecedented import surge that actually dragged headline GDP into negative territory. But as the president escalated his tariff offensive, imports collapsed just as dramatically in the second quarter, turning net exports into a significant growth driver.
Even as Trump publicly lambasts the Federal Reserve for inaction, interest rates have remained unchanged. Chair Jerome Powell and his colleagues have insisted on holding fire until the full impact of tarifs on inflation and activity becomes clearer—a stance that has reportedly frustrated White House officials eager for easier monetary policy.
Job growth has all but stalled. The July employment report surprised on the downside, showing far fewer new positions than economists had forecast and slashing prior months’ gains by a combined 258,000 jobs. “This jobs report is not ideal,” conceded Stephen Miran, chairman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers, before predicting that reduced policy uncertainty would drive a turnaround in hiring.
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