Donald Trump says the Joe Biden Administration has been “a disaster” for ordinary Americans. I don’t know what data he is looking at, but like his Big Lie that he won the 2020 election, the facts don’t match up with his rhetoric.

The U.S. economy is leading the world, even beating worldwide post-pandemic inflation. Not China. Not Japan. The United States. A combination of good policies, the right priorities, and wise decisions of the Biden Administration got us here.

Trump says he had the best economy in U.S. history. Again, not even close, unless he is talking about the top 1% of Americans who received massive tax cuts while he was president.

For ordinary Americans, however, Biden has a far better record of accomplishments.

Let’s look at some fundamentals. How about access to affordable health care insurance? According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the U.S. uninsured rate has decreased by 26% during the Biden Administration.

It dropped from 10.3% in 2019, Trump’s last year in office, to 6% in 2023. An additional 8.2 million Americans now have health care insurance that did not have it under the Trump Administration.

How about the national debt? In a recent study, the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget found that “Trump increased long-term borrowing at twice the rate of President Biden.” Moreover, according to the report, Biden cut the annual budget deficit by a factor of four compared to Trump.

According to the report, “Trump approved $8.4 trillion of new 10-year borrowing during his full term in office. President Biden, in his first three years and five months in office, approved $4.3 trillion of new 10-year borrowing.”

A significant amount of the debt accumulated during both administrations is a direct result of large tax cuts signed by Trump in December 2017 which cut corporate tax rates by almost 40%.

While Republicans told us the Trump tax cuts would grow the American economy and generate an additional $1 trillion in revenue, the Congressional Budget Office warned them the tax cuts would add $1.9 trillion in debt before they expire in 2025. The CBO was correct, of course.

If Trump is elected, he has promised to extend his 2017 tax cuts for another 10 years. If he does, the CBO estimates that the federal debt will grow by another $4.6 trillion.

Republicans continue to pretend more tax cuts for corporations and billionaires will trickle down to the rest of us. But they never do. Instead of sharing the extra revenue with workers, corporations took their 2017 tax cuts and increased their stock buybacks, according to Robert Reich, who worked for four presidents, Democrats and Republicans, on various economic advisory boards.

As stated by Reich, “A recent study by economists from the Joint Committee on Taxation and the Federal Reserve Board found that workers below the 90th percentile of their firm’s income scale saw no change in earnings from the Trump tax cuts. Earnings rose only for those at the top, with the largest gains for those at the very top.” In other words, the rich got richer while everyone else saw no benefit from the tax cuts.

Biden has stated he will not extend the Trump tax cuts. Instead, he has proposed that billionaires pay at least 25% of their income in taxes and corporations pay at least 21%. They were paying 35% before the Trump tax cuts of 2017.

While Trump’s extension of his 2017 tax cuts would add $4.6 trillion to the national debt, according to the CBO, Biden’s plan would increase revenue and reduce the national debt by $3.8 trillion.
Most importantly, Biden’s plan would have billionaires like Trump finally paying their fair share as they once did.

According to The New York Times, Trump paid zero federal taxes in 10 of the 15 years before taking office and paid just $750 during his first two years in the White House.

Let’s look at job growth. Biden has created almost 16 million jobs in less than four years. This is more than any other president in history. Trump recorded a net negative job growth of almost three million during his four years. He is the only modern-day president to lose jobs while serving in the White House.

Trump predicted in 2019 that if Biden won the election “the stock market would crash” and “you would have a depression the likes of which you’ve never seen. Your 401(k)s will go to hell and it’ll be a very, very sad day for his country.” In looking at Biden’s performance compared to Trump’s economic predictions, however, it is clear Trump didn’t have a clue in 2019 and continues to spread false information about the current U.S. economy.

Here are the facts: On the day of Biden’s inauguration, the New York Stock Exchange closed at 13,457. At the end of 2023, it closed at 16,852, a 25% increase. Last week, on June 28, it closed at 18,009. Thus, the New York Stock Exchange, along with our retirement funds, is up 33.8% since Biden’s inauguration. Not bad for an old guy.

Trump also warned in 2019 that if he didn’t win, “American’s suburbs will be overwhelmed with violence and crime.” Crime peaked during Trump’s last year in office and has been decreasing during the Biden Administration. According to the FBI, murder decreased 6.1% from 2021 to 2022, and violent crime in 2023 was 8% lower than in 2022.

Property crime decreased by 6.3% to the lowest level since 1961. American cities observed significant decreases in violent crime during the Biden Administration. For example, in 2023, Detroit had the lowest murder rate since 1966.

Here is a simple indicator of who cares about ordinary Americans, especially American workers.

Look at their positions on the minimum wage. Trump and his fellow Republicans insist the federal minimum wage of $7.25 is just fine and continue to block efforts by Democrats to increase it. But 22 states, led mostly by Democrats, have enacted new minimum wage increases that at least double the Republican standard of $7.25 per hour.

Actions speak louder than words. Trump is, and has been, all talk. The old man in the White House, however, is getting things done for ordinary Americans.