Title: Shocking Poll Reveals Americans Feel Worse Off Under President Biden – What Will This Mean for the Election?
ALMOST half of Americans feel worse off today than in 2020, according to a bombshell new poll, in a blow to President Biden’s reelection chances. In an exclusive survey commissioned for The U.S. Sun, less than a third of Americans say they feel better off now than when Biden took office four years ago.
Americans Upset with Economic Situation
The poll also revealed that across the generations, US voters feel increasingly alarmed about the economy after four years of Biden’s presidency. It found that a whopping 42% of Americans feel less financially secure than they did four years ago. That compares to just 30% who said they feel more financially secure than in 2020. Just 8% of respondents in Generation X (born between 1965 and 1980), said they feel “much more” financially secure. In contrast, almost a quarter (24%) of Gen X reported feeling “much less” financially secure.
Financial Concerns Across Generations
Respondents from the Baby Boomer generation (born between 1946 and 1964) reported similar levels of pessimism about their financial circumstances following Biden’s first term in the White House. Only 7% of Boomers reported feeling “much more” financially secure today, while $29% said they felt “much less” financially secure. And in particularly damning figures for the incumbent president, only 36% of self-declared Democrat voters said they felt more financially secure than they did four years ago.
Voters Expressing Discontent
Only 28% of Republicans reported feeling better off than before Biden’s election. The economy frequently comes up as the most important issue for Americans when they enter the polling booth. In that spirit, The U.S. Sun took to the streets of New York City to gauge the views of ordinary Americans going into the election campaign. Amid the hustle and bustle of Times Square, many punters seemed less than enthused with the likely choices facing them in November.
Hope for Better Economic Policies
One voter from Mississippi said he wanted to vote for neither Biden nor Trump and said he wanted the next president to put lowering taxes as their top priority. “Neither, I don’t have anybody that I really want to vote for,” he said. “We get taxed three or four times before we take anything home.” While one voter from Georgia described himself as a Biden supporter but still wasn’t inspired by the option. And another voter from Brooklyn, New York, said he was voting for Trump because he wanted to see more “capitalism” in America.
Understanding the Candidates’ Platforms
The economy has often been the focus of past election campaigns as well. In 1992, Democrat candidate Bill Clinton’s successful campaign came to be most associated with the four-word phrase “It’s the economy, stupid.” It was coined by Clinton’s strategist James Carville, and was one of three messages directed at campaign workers. Although it was never an official campaign slogan, the simple expression became one of the most popular soundbites in American political history. Clinton swept to power over incumbent George H W Bush in 1992, emphasizing the economy in the wake of the early 1990s recession as one of the crucial factors in the victory.
Impact of the Economy on Elections
With Americans feeling less secure economically and gloomier about their prospects, it will be down to President Biden and his Republican challenger – likely to be former President Donald Trump – to convince voters that they will make them feel better off. While unemployment remains at its lowest rate in 50 years, anxiety over inflation and soaring prices for many essentials have dominated the political debates ahead of November’s election. Although the rise in inflation has slowed in the past year, in April, consumer prices were still 3.4% higher than in 2022. The target set by the Federal Reserve is 2%.
Many of the highest rises have been for everyday essentials, including housing costs, which are up 5.5% on last year, according to figures from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and Energy Information Administration. Electricity prices are 4.8% up on last year, marking another damaging blow to ordinary Americans’ wallets. These rises are partly down to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which saw both the US and the European Union place embargoes on cheap Russian oil and natural gas.
Looking to the Future
The Federal Reserve has responded to soaring inflation by raising interest rates several times, making it more expensive for businesses and consumers to borrow money. And reports show many ordinary Americans are tightening their belts in the face of higher prices. If November’s election does turn out to be about “the economy, stupid,” once again, these polls make grim reading for President Biden and the Democrats.