Q: Inflation substantially increased during the Biden-Harris administration. How much responsibility do you take for that?
A: Let’s look at the numbers. At the time of the 2020 election, the economy had been crushed by the pandemic and Trump’s chaotic response to it. Unemployment was coming down but was over six percent. Americans couldn’t safely leave their homes to work. They needed help.
We gave it to them. As a result, our recovery was the fastest in the world. Child poverty fell dramatically. Unemployment went down below four percent for a time and is still slightly over four percent today even though the size of the workforce has grown significantly since 2021. If our spending resulted in inflation that was slightly higher than Europe’s, we don’t apologize for that, because the overall picture was favorable.
Inflation was a worldwide phenomenon resulting primarily from supply chain problems and changes to spending patterns arising from the pandemic. The best analyses indicate that our safety net spending probably added about two percent to it. Since that spending alleviated mass hardship and fueled our rapid recovery, it was worth it.
Today, the Fed is ready to cut interest rates. The battle against inflation, in a sense, has been won. But certain kinds of inflation, like the cost of housing and medical care, predated the pandemic and still persist. We are dealing with them with programs to cut the cost of medicine and to build millions of new dwelling units. These programs will make life better for average Americans.
Trump, on the other hand, wants to impose what amounts to a national sales tax on consumers that will be experienced as a new round of inflation. His plans to deport millions of workers will also wreck businesses and cause prices to go up. He is the last person on the planet to accuse us of stoking inflation.