Since November 6, critics have pointed this out Joe BidenEconomic policies are one explanation for this Donald Trumpvictory. Many post-mortem studies have focused on price hikes that led to voter frustration. Meanwhile, Atlantic Jonathan Chait Argue Last week, Biden’s costly efforts to stimulate manufacturing in the country’s heartland failed to recover Working class Democrats. Dylan Matthews, from Fox, Blame Biden’s inability to prioritize and choose between his policy goals, resulting in “a failed presidency that left Biden without much of a lasting domestic policy legacy.”
There is a long-standing tendency in the United States to view single-term presidents – Jimmy Carter and George H. W. Bush – as failures, even if some of their policy achievements turn out to be of great importance. (Carter created the Departments of Energy and Education; no Republican president since Bush has passed broad tax increases on corporations and the wealthy.) But the tendency to characterize Biden’s time in office as a failure is crucial. Especially problematic. Whatever one thinks of his decision to run again or his handling of Gaza, his administration’s campaign is to create a low-carbon economy by supporting the growth of the Gaza Strip. Green energy and Green manufacturing It was a historic development, and its records are on Jobs and GDP growth Very powerful. The Labor Department’s December employment report showed that employers created another quarter of a million jobs last month, bringing the total since Biden’s election to more than 17.5 million, while the unemployment rate fell to 4.1 percent. GDP expanded at a rapid rate of 3.1% in the third quarter of last year, and according to the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta’s GDP model, growth in the fourth quarter is likely to reach 3%. (A preliminary estimate of the actual number will be announced at the end of the month.)
Last week, I called Jared Bernstein, chairman of Biden’s Council of Economic Advisers, to get his final thoughts as he prepares to leave office. The sixty-nine-year-old said he had already filled his desk, including a photo of Biden standing under an “Economics” sign, which now hung in his home exercise room, next to his stationary bike. Understandably, he was keen to frame Biden’s record in a positive light. Earlier that morning, he had spoken before a panel at the Brookings Institution, a think tank six blocks north of the White House. The event was held to mark the publication of the 2025 edition of the Economic Report of the President (ERP), an annual update mandated by Congress. In his remarks during the session, Bernstein noted that the economy has “outperformed even the most optimistic expectations over the past few years” in terms of employment and growth. He also acknowledged what he described as a “forty-year high in inflation,” which saw inflation rise to 9.1% in June 2022. In what sounded like a farewell message to Trump’s incoming economic team, he called for a “middle way” on trade policy.
In a break from the policies of previous Democratic administrations, the Biden administration has maintained tariffs on Chinese goods introduced by Trump during his first term, and imposed new restrictions of its own on exports of semiconductor chips and other high-tech products to China. . Bernstein defended these restrictions on the grounds that China’s industrial dominance threatens American workers and also cited national security issues. He noted that the decline in imports from China was offset by larger inflows from Mexico, Vietnam and other countries. Without mentioning Trump directly, he said the Biden administration rejected “reductionist views like the trade deficit is a scorecard, and if it gets bigger you lose.” “
During our conversation, Bernstein was more explicit in his criticism Populist election promises Which Trump campaigned on, in his attempt to win a second term, which includes imposing global tariffs on imports Mass deportations of undocumented workers. “Targeted tariffs can be helpful, but I don’t think that’s the case for blanket tariffs,” he said. “Mass deportations will impact labor supply, especially in sectors like construction. The combination of sweeping tariffs, mass deportations, and perhaps even compromising the independence of the Federal Reserve, would all likely lead to significant inflation, others have noted.”
Bernstein began advising Vice President Biden in 2008. He joined the Council of Economic Advisers early in the administration, and took over as chair in February 2023. As a longtime economist at the liberal Economic Policy Institute in Washington, he made his reputation during the 1990s by engaging with His fellow economist Lawrence Mischel co-authors an invaluable biennial report on “The State of Work.” America,” which tracked wages, inequality, unemployment, and health care coverage, among other things. He told me that his interest in labor and inequality issues may have been why Biden chose him as an advisor. “Fair slice economics is what has always united me with the president,” he said. .
When I asked Bernstein what he was proudest of in Biden’s record, he pointed to maintaining full employment even as the Fed raised interest rates sharply to bring inflation back toward its 2 percent target. “Many experts have told us that in order to bring inflation down, we will have to accept a much higher unemployment rate,” he said. “That was a trade-off we were not willing to make.” Speaking at the Brookings Institution, Bernstein cited some of the broader benefits of lower unemployment rates: A strong labor market can encourage employers to hire from a broader pool of candidates, thus providing more opportunities for minority workers, and increasing competition. Employment can motivate companies to make investments that enhance productivity. Lee also stressed the importance of enhancing the wage negotiation leverage that tight labor markets provide employees. Strengthening the bargaining power of workers was a The central element of BidenomicsHe said. “That’s also why he was a pro-union president — the first to walk the picket line.”
Biden’s concern about labor issues was real enough. (At the request of leaders of the United Steelworkers union, he recently blocked Japan’s takeover of US Steel.) But even with a narrow majority in the Senate during Biden’s term, Democrats were unable to recall the 60 votes that would have been hers. necessary to pass For professionals The law, which would have made it easier to organize unions, was unable to raise the federal minimum wage, which remains only $7.25 an hour. Even more significant than Biden’s gestures toward organized labor were four major pieces of legislation passed by Congress during his first two years in office, which Bernstein praised as unprecedented.
As ERP explains, $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan Act The 2021 family budget, which included cash payments of fourteen hundred dollars to individuals in low- and middle-income families, strengthened the financial situation of families. Bipartisan $1.2 trillion Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act 2021 brought a boom in construction projects at the state and local levels. Eight hundred and ninety-one billion dollars Inflation reduction law The 2022 law, which provided support and grants to makers of electric vehicles, electric batteries, and other green technologies, generated a boom in investments in manufacturing. So did two hundred and eighty billion dollars chips and the Science Act of 2022, which is designed to encourage semiconductor remanufacturing. Factory construction rose to record levels in 2024, and some new facilities, including a state-of-the-art factory in Arizona owned by Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., are already up and running. “If there is any justice to history, a temporary spike in inflation will not be Biden’s lasting legacy,” Bernstein told me. “I think Biden’s biggest legacy will be the adoption of what he calls bottom-up and middle-out economics, and an investment agenda that creates new manufacturing industries in the United States.”
