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The bursting of President Donald Trump's economy has been a constant since he took office in early 2017, but new claims last week overstated the US economic strength and falsely dubbed him. administration of unprecedented success.
"The GDP rate (4.2%) is higher than the unemployment rate (3.9%) for the first time in more than 100 years!" Trump tweeted on Monday.
Contrary to what Trump claims, this is the 64th quarter of the last 70 years in which the unemployment rate was lower than the quarterly GDP figure. The most recent took place in 2006.
Trump also erroneously said Monday that the economy was "perhaps the best in our country's history".
GDP growth reached 4.2% in the second quarter, the highest level since the third quarter of 2014, but it is still not the best since the last recession. In fact, quarterly GDP growth has surpassed the 4.2% mark four times since the recession, and the last reading is well below record levels.
Trump also said that GDP growth would have dropped considerably if Hillary Clinton won the presidency.
"If the Democrats won the elections in 2016, the GDP, which was about 1% and down, would have been minus 4% instead of 4.2%" Trump tweeted on Monday. "I opened our magnificent economic engine with regulation and tax cuts."
The claim closely mirrored Trump's comment during a conversation with veteran journalist Bob Woodward, released last Tuesday.
"If the other administration or representatives of it had continued to advance, you know, if the other group had won, I would tell you, you would have, I think you would have a GDP below zero," Trump claimed. "I think we would have gone in the wrong direction because regulation plays a big role in what we did, Bob."
The president also praised the GDP figure in the Montana and North Dakota speeches last week.
Although GDP growth accelerated in the second quarter, it is difficult to determine how much of the increase is directly attributable to Trump's policies – or any administration -.
Economists say that part of the stimulus is due to transitional factors, such as the increase in soybean exports ahead of Trump's tariffs, and that recent government policies such as the law
But most of the recent strength of the economy is the continuation of a long trend after the recession, as unemployment continues to decline and US consumers continue to spend. The same trends in employment and personal consumption existed before the 2016 election and it is unclear what government policy could have done to bring it back to a -4% recession level.
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