Gasoline<\/a> is another major item many Americans purchase, and its price has soared since Trump launched the Iran war in February and Iran responded by blocking the Strait of Hormuz.<\/p>\nArticle continues below this ad<\/p>\n
Today’s nationwide average gasoline price per gallon is among the highest ever recorded.<\/p>\n
Mortgage rates also fell from 6.96% when Trump took office in January 2025 to 5.98% in late February, but they have since risen to 6.36%.<\/p>\n
Wages outpaced inflation early in Trump\u2019s second term, but not anymore<\/p>\n
Early in 2025, wages grew robustly, consistently outpacing inflation. But inflation has picked up since the Iran war started, and now those early wage gains have all but disappeared.<\/p>\n
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Consumer loan delinquency has risen steadily<\/p>\n
Feeling the inflation squeeze, consumers are struggling more with debt as they turn to credit to cover costs. One measure, the share of loaned money that is delinquent in being repaid, has increased steadily during Trump\u2019s second term.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Delinquency rates for credit card debt and auto loan debt are roughly the same as during the Great Recession, which peaked in 2009. Mortgage and home-equity loan delinquencies are below their Great Recession levels, although they have also risen during Trump\u2019s second term.<\/p>\n
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Job creation in Trump\u2019s second term has lagged<\/p>\n
Job creation in Trump\u2019s second term has trailed several recent presidents, including his own first term and his predecessor, Joe Biden. Presidents George\u00a0W. Bush and Barack Obama saw jobs decline during their first 16 months, but they were contending with recessions, which Trump hasn\u2019t during his second term.<\/p>\n
The entirety of the job gains have come from one sector, healthcare. Subtracting those from the total leaves a net loss for the rest of the economy \u2014 down 34,500 jobs.<\/p>\n
Americans are telling pollsters they aren\u2019t pleased with the economy, inflation<\/p>\n
You don\u2019t have to use economic data to determine how Americans feel about the economy. You can ask them directly \u2014 and the consensus is that they are not happy.<\/p>\n
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One frequently cited metric by economists and journalists is the University of Michigan Consumer Sentiment Index.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The score for March 2026, the most recent month, was 53.3. That\u2019s the ninth-lowest score since the monthly survey began in 1978. Of those nine lowest marks, five have come during Trump\u2019s second term. (Two happened during 40-year-high inflation under Biden in 2022 and two came during even higher inflation under Jimmy Carter in 1980.)<\/p>\n
Other public opinion polls also frequently ask Americans about their opinions on the economy. One widely used polling aggregator is compiled by Silver Bulletin, a website published by\u00a0FiveThirtyEight.com founder Nate Silver.<\/p>\n
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It collects polling data to produce “net approval” measurements, which refer to the share of respondents saying they approve of the president\u2019s handling of a given issue minus the share saying they disapprove. A positive net approval number means the president has more approvers than disapprovers; a negative net approval number means they have more disapprovers than approvers.<\/p>\n
During his second term, net approval for Trump\u2019s handling of the economy has cratered. It began in positive territory when he was inaugurated in January 2025 but turned negative the next month. Since then, his net approval has continued to sink; in mid-May, disapproval exceeded approval by more than 24 percentage points. And approval for Trump\u2019s handling of inflation has fared worse; disapproval exceeds approval by nearly 40 percentage points.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A sign advertises the prices for regular unleaded gasoline (top) and diesel as motorists fill up at a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":665308,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[28,101],"class_list":["post-665307","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-business","tag-economy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/665307","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=665307"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/665307\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/665308"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=665307"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=665307"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=665307"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}