Republicans live in a different America than Democrats. That's hardly the case with the results of the University of Michigan's monthly consumer survey. Consumers are asked monthly about the general economic situation and their own finances and what spending plans they have. Responses are filtered into an index. A value of around 100 indicates a good mood, while a value of 50 indicates a crisis.
The latest poll results again show a surprisingly large gap: 101.3 for Democrats in January. On the other hand, Republican consumer sentiment was 57.7. Even during the financial crisis in 2008, Republicans were in better shape than they are now.
While Republicans were excited
The mood of the political camps was almost never the same. But the odds were significantly smaller over the decades. This changed in the last phase of the administration of Democratic President Barack Obama and became more pronounced under President Donald Trump, who after winning the primary election in the state of New Hampshire, has a good chance of becoming the Republican candidate in the presidential election. to compete in early November.
40 point margins were the order of the day for him. In February 2020, with Trump in office just before the pandemic, Republicans were visibly happier with an index value of 127.2, a record never measured before, while Democrats expressed satisfaction below 80 points.
20 months later, in November 2021, the index for Republicans stood at 37.8 points, the lowest value in four decades. Democrats, on the other hand, are significantly more positive about the public and personal economic situation, expressed at 88.4 points.
The gap between fact and opinion
The values show that political opinions clearly influence consumer sentiment, more so than ever before. A Democrat in the White House brightens the mood of Democratic consumers, while a Republican president encourages Republican-leaning consumers. Only: Republicans are more extreme in their rejection and approval. They cheer louder when a Democrat is in power, and they cheer harder when the opposition is in power.
Republicans deviate from the consumer sentiment model by 15 points, while Democrats deviate by 6 points. Scientists Ryan Cummings and Neil Mahoney, who chaired the event, talk about asymmetric proliferation.
The mood barometer shows how difficult it is for President Joe Biden to convince non-Democrats of the successes of his economic policies, and why the overall mood is worse than the situation. The poor mentality of Republicans is demeaning to the average person. But that alone cannot explain the gap between relatively positive economic data and sentiment. Cummings and Mahoney come to the same conclusion. But what else is in play?
There is no room for talk of recession
Last October, the financial institution Bankrate conducted a survey on the state of the economy with remarkable results: almost 60 percent of those surveyed said that the United States is in a recession. The highest income earners were daily wage earners, the young, the old and the rural people agreed with the city dwellers. Even race and gender made no difference.
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