Is this a normal sign of economic contraction

[Oldcarpy2]

I just checked a few videos and Trump is not shaking hands with people that are not there.

Phew.  That's ok then.....

[putnam6]

Discuss away.

I just think its funny this can be a feather in Trump's economic cap somehow.  

"See! Trump lowered the global price of oil overnight and all you haters can hate!"

"Yeah.... but the price is going to reset at 5 to 10 dollars more per barrel then the day before he attacked Iran. How is this not a net loss again?"

"You just dont get it."

It's like a Christopher Nolan movie. 

Why dont i just argue Biden was the BEST president EVER because our GDP grew 6.3% IN 2021? 

Or that 2020 was the greatest year for airline passenger growth, and it was all thanks to Biden?

Would anyone buy that?

Same logic, really.

i care about the economy too, but i got into Rand and Friedman, so I think Trump's economy dug up the grave of Neoliberalism and slapped import tariffs on it before adding extra government nails to it's casket and encasing it in concrete.

Not a feather, per se, but it's not the predicted economic collapse bandied about in other threads either,

This is the salient point Im trying to highlight, here in The Global Meltdown forum, the economy didnt collapse.

Hell, it's not even a recession....

Looks like the BBC stuck a feather in Uncle Sam's 2026 economic outlook hat.

Are you suggesting the illustrious BBC is dishing out macaroni instead? 

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cwy031el03po

In fact, American employers added 172,000 jobs in May, smashing expectations.
But new inflation data this week, showing consumer prices rising at their fastest pace in three years, suggests the limits of America's resilience may be approaching. Prices in May were 4.2% higher than a year earlier, up from 3.8% in April.
America's economy may be outperforming many of its rivals. That does not mean it is immune. Higher energy prices, stubborn inflation and widening inequality all pose risks that could erode the country's current advantage.
Even so, compared with many other advanced economies, the US continues to look robust. Its combination of flexible markets, rapid investment, abundant energy, and tolerance for risk has helped it weather shocks that have strained its peers.

 

[putnam6]

I just checked a few videos and Trump is not shaking hands with people that are not there.

[EXETER]

As has been mentioned before, the obvious irony
[Image: https://denyignorance.com/uploader/image...671a77.jpg]

and hopefully back to relevant comments for the Global meltdown forum

Shoeless
@ShoelessTX
BREAKING: That shows a healthy economy. Hard to add wealth when the economy is tanking, as democrats not only say is happening, they actively wish for it because they hate Trump so much that they would sacrifice the American people to make him look bad.

In May, the US added 147,000 non-farm jobs, which would be another economic indicator

OK, let's discuss the economy.  

First, that bit about the stock market hitting 52,000 for the first time ever.  The stock market is ALWAYS hitting new record highs.  Every President in my lifetime can legitimately claim that the stock market reached record highs during his term.  That's because the stock market generally follows the trend of the GDP, and the GDP has been growing exponentially since basically the founding of the nation. And that's because the population of the US has been growing exponentially for most of its existence and worker productivity has been also growing exponentially.  Go look at an exponential curve.  Next year it will always be higher than it is today.  The year after that it will be higher still. Those facts have basically nothing to do with whoever happens to occupy the Oval Office at any given time, for the most part.  

A President can cause blips upward or downward but often as unintended consequences of other actions.  For example, when FDR entered us into WW2, he took over about 20% of the entire nation's economy to fight the War.  Unemployment went to less than zero, GDP jumped to unheard-of levels, women and minorities were brought into the workforce, and the US ended the War having taken the lead in jet aircraft, computers, nuclear energy, antibiotics, etc., and owning more than half the wealth of the entire planet.  That was the unintended consequence of mobilizing to win WW2, and it is probably what finally got us out of the Great Depression of the 1930s.

In Trump's case, he inherited an economy that had grown 6.1% in 2021 (Biden's first year in office), 2.5% in 2022 and 2023, and 2.8% in 2024.  Then he came in to office in 2025, put tariffs on the entire known universe, and the GDP growth predictably went down to 2.1%.  In 2026, he started a pointless war and the current projection is for 2.3% GDP growth for 2026.  Yes, the economy is still growing, but at a noticeably lower rate than under Biden.  The economy would be better off today if Trump had spent the entire time of his second term on the golf course.

When it comes to job growth, 2025 saw the weakest job growth in about 20 years.  It wasn't zero, but it was sub-par.  

None of this is killing the economy, but overall, Trump is making the US economy weaker.  Nothing to celebrate here.

[chr0naut]

Being narcissistic is common among people in business. It is considered required by some.

No, narcissism is a mental illness.

In business, narcissism stifles innovation, leads to a high staff turnover due to factors such as lack of empathy, credit stealing and creating toxic work environments. And narcissists are prone to reckless risk-taking because they cannot conceive that anything they might do is stupid or wrong. Also narcissists cannot maintain operational constancy and though they may have occasional wins, most of what they attempt, fails.

Why narcissistic bosses are bad for business: new research

Unintelligent is common among many in elected office. Why would anyone that is smart want all the headaches involved. The smart ones are mostly in it for other reasons. 

John Quincy Adams: ≈ 168 - 175 (Harvard graduate, top of historical estimates)
Thomas Jefferson: ≈ 153 - 160 (Author of the Declaration of Independence)
John F. Kennedy: ≈ 150 - 160
Barack Obama: ≈ 145 - 155 (Columbia and Harvard Law graduate)
Bill Clinton: ≈ 148 - 159 (Rhodes Scholar)
George W. Bush: ≈ 124 (Yale and Harvard Business School graduate)
Joe Biden: ≈ 115 (University of Delaware and Syracuse University Law graduate)

I think Trump's IQ is perhaps a little higher than Biden's? Perhaps 120-130? But his vocabulary is limited:

Study Finds Trump Has The Vocabulary Of An 8-Year-Old Child

Senile, not really. Biden was the champion of that while in office.

It's not like Biden being senile makes it impossible for others to be just as senile, or worse. The world is full of people who have gone senile. There are evidences that Trumb is degenerating mentally as he ages.

Trumb is now older than Biden was while Biden was in office as POTUS. Trumb is showing worsening geriatric health issues and his doctors keep giving him cognitive tests (which Trumb thinks he aces in some sort of achievement). The old saying goes, "Where there is smoke, there is fire..."

Unpredictable, that is to his advantage. If all in office were predictable, what would be the use of negotiation?

]/quote]

Trumb negotiate? LOL.

[quote]It would be only forgone conclusions I believe is the term. 

And the Western world will still be around after he is just a memory. 

Trumb is authorized to use launch the USA's atomic weapons. There are no checks and balances that moderate that power, no higher office to appeal to. He is POTUS, and if he launches, no-one can stop him.

You seem to want predictable politicians that look to be playing the game as it always has been. Those that somehow gain many times their pay while in office and vote for pork projects as long as their pork project gets voted for also.

Where is the advantage to the people in that?

In the real world, there is usually only one 'optimal path'. Any good statesman would strive to achieve the optimal, which is why they would be also predictable.

A 'loose cannon' can't be expected to hit a target, and Trumb is very much a 'ready, fire, aim' type of guy.

[BeyondKnowledge]

No, narcissism is a mental illness.

In business, narcissism stifles innovation, leads to a high staff turnover due to factors such as lack of empathy, credit stealing and creating toxic work environments. And narcissists are prone to reckless risk-taking because they cannot conceive that anything they might do is stupid or wrong. Also narcissists cannot maintain operational constancy and though they may have occasional wins, most of what they attempt, fails.

Why narcissistic bosses are bad for business: new research


John Quincy Adams: ≈ 168 - 175 (Harvard graduate, top of historical estimates)
Thomas Jefferson: ≈ 153 - 160 (Author of the Declaration of Independence)
John F. Kennedy: ≈ 150 - 160
Barack Obama: ≈ 145 - 155 (Columbia and Harvard Law graduate)
Bill Clinton: ≈ 148 - 159 (Rhodes Scholar)
George W. Bush: ≈ 124 (Yale and Harvard Business School graduate)
Joe Biden: ≈ 115 (University of Delaware and Syracuse University Law graduate)

I think Trump's IQ is perhaps a little higher than Biden's? Perhaps 120-130? But his vocabulary is limited:

Study Finds Trump Has The Vocabulary Of An 8-Year-Old Child


It's not like Biden being senile makes it impossible for others to be just as senile, or worse. The world is full of people who have gone senile. There are evidences that Trumb is degenerating mentally as he ages.

Trumb is now older than Biden was while Biden was in office as POTUS. Trumb is showing worsening geriatric health issues and his doctors keep giving him cognitive tests (which Trumb thinks he aces in some sort of achievement). The old saying goes, "Where there is smoke, there is fire..."


Trumb is authorized to use launch the USA's atomic weapons. There are no checks and balances that moderate that power, no higher office to appeal to. He is POTUS, and if he launches, no-one can stop him.


In the real world, there is usually only one 'optimal path'. Any good statesman would strive to achieve the optimal, which is why they would be also predictable.

A 'loose cannon' can't be expected to hit a target, and Trumb is very much a 'ready, fire, aim' type of guy.

I never said they were all stupid. It is common though.
On behalf of my home state of Georgia, I do apologize for that guy.

You are looking at it from medical phycology and not from articles on successful business people. That is like you saying a normal honest person can be a used car salesman or lawyer. No, most can't.

Loose cannon? That got him a lot of votes both times.

[putnam6]

OK, let's discuss the economy.  

First, that bit about the stock market hitting 52,000 for the first time ever.  The stock market is ALWAYS hitting new record highs.  Every President in my lifetime can legitimately claim that the stock market reached record highs during his term.  That's because the stock market generally follows the trend of the GDP, and the GDP has been growing exponentially since basically the founding of the nation. And that's because the population of the US has been growing exponentially for most of its existence and worker productivity has been also growing exponentially.  Go look at an exponential curve.  Next year it will always be higher than it is today.  The year after that it will be higher still. Those facts have basically nothing to do with whoever happens to occupy the Oval Office at any given time, for the most part.  

A President can cause blips upward or downward but often as unintended consequences of other actions.  For example, when FDR entered us into WW2, he took over about 20% of the entire nation's economy to fight the War.  Unemployment went to less than zero, GDP jumped to unheard-of levels, women and minorities were brought into the workforce, and the US ended the War having taken the lead in jet aircraft, computers, nuclear energy, antibiotics, etc., and owning more than half the wealth of the entire planet.  That was the unintended consequence of mobilizing to win WW2, and it is probably what finally got us out of the Great Depression of the 1930s.

In Trump's case, he inherited an economy that had grown 6.1% in 2021 (Biden's first year in office), 2.5% in 2022 and 2023, and 2.8% in 2024.  Then he came in to office in 2025, put tariffs on the entire known universe, and the GDP growth predictably went down to 2.1%.  In 2026, he started a pointless war and the current projection is for 2.3% GDP growth for 2026.  Yes, the economy is still growing, but at a noticeably lower rate than under Biden.  The economy would be better off today if Trump had spent the entire time of his second term on the golf course.

When it comes to job growth, 2025 saw the weakest job growth in about 20 years.  It wasn't zero, but it was sub-par.  

None of this is killing the economy, but overall, Trump is making the US economy weaker.  Nothing to celebrate here.

Yay, it took 2 and a half pages FFS

All I asked was if this was a sign of economic contraction.

The BBC suggests that the US economy is more resilient than most here predict.

Enough here predicted oil at $200-a-barrel, and with no fertilizers getting through the Strait, we would have no crops, and the world would slip into inevitable famine and misery. 

It's the same pleading, tedious, emotional bullshit
no different than the left screaming, COVID vaccine deniers" were threatening

The majority live in the middle and are fairly sick and tired of every issue being touted
as the worst-case scenario, solely because of who is President.

Just because something makes you anxious doesn't mean that it should be everybody's response trajectory.

Peace talks in Vietnam took years.... this is just the beginning, I expect the MOU to collapse in weeks, if not, days, which will likely result in more drones and missiles being launched and subsequently being shot down 

It's all part of the process

[Oldcarpy2]

[Video: https://youtu.be/QjG958lZ1KI]

I never said they were all stupid. It is common though.
On behalf of my home state of Georgia, I do apologize for that guy.

You are looking at it from medical phycology and not from articles on successful business people. That is like you saying a normal honest person can be a used car salesman or lawyer. No, most can't.

Loose cannon? That got him a lot of votes both times.

He's a convicted felon and has multiple bankrupt businesses stiffing tradesmen and creditors.

But, carry on worshipping the guy.

Your lucky that he didn't owe you for your knickers, sunshine.

[BeyondKnowledge]

He's a convicted felon and has multiple bankrupt businesses stiffing tradesmen and creditors.

But, carry on worshipping the guy.

Your lucky that he didn't owe you for your knickers, sunshine.

Exactly what part of 'I don't hate Trump' makes you think I worship the guy?

He makes mistakes. I don't like everything he does. But the alternative from the last election would have been a disaster.

Not everything is about your opinion.

[chr0naut]

[Video: https://youtu.be/QjG958lZ1KI]

I never said they were all stupid. It is common though.
On behalf of my home state of Georgia, I do apologize for that guy.

You are looking at it from medical phycology and not from articles on successful business people. That is like you saying a normal honest person can be a used car salesman or lawyer. No, most can't.

Loose cannon? That got him a lot of votes both times.