After the stock market surge of 2017, turbulence has been the market’s theme of 2018. After a historic surge in stocks to begin the year, the market has since endured two corrections that left the markets flat on the year, though the market is currently in the green for the year. Despite all the setbacks, however, the Trump stock market is still among the best performing in American history.
On the worst drawdown this year, the Dow Jones lost 11.6% of its value from peak to trough. While this led to headlines from liberal publications mocking the strength of Trump’s stock market, such drawdowns happen nearly every single year. If you look at the largest annual drawdowns in stock prices since 1928, its 2017 that was an anomaly in seeing no major crashes, while 2018 is just a return to normal. Most years have streaks where stocks lose 10, 20 or 30+ percent of value over a course of days, weeks, or months.
In fact, as Reuters noted, Trump’s market growth at this point in his presidency is the best since Eisenhower. “The S&P 500 has risen 28 percent since Trump’s election in November 2016 to the eve of congressional midterm elections last Tuesday. This surpasses the market’s performance over the same time frame under any other president in the past 64 years. Under President Dwight Eisenhower, the S&P 500 rose 29 percent from his election in November 1952 through November 1954.”
But What About People Who Don’t Own Stocks?
Granted, the stock market and the economy aren’t one in the same. But the market rise is a reflection of general economic well being in America under Trump. While the booming stock market may not benefit low-income workers who don’t own stocks, they are benefitting from the booming economy driving the market. In fact, so strong is Trump’s economy that Barack Obama is trying to take credit for it. It’s hilarious that Obama blamed Bush throughout his entire presidency, and is now trying to claim that his actions are finally taking effect. And Obama trying to take credit for the Trump economy is not only laughable, it’s verifiably false.
How do we know the Trump economy isn’t a continuation of the Obama economy? One way would be to look at economic projections from Obama’s last year in office and compare them against how those projections were realized under Trump. For example, in 2016 Obama’s Congressional Budget Office projected that economic growth would be 2.2% in 2017, and 2.1% in 2018. In reality, growth did come in close at 2.3% in 2017, but that was before the Trump tax cuts were passed. Economic growth is expected to come in around 3% this year. As for a whole host of other economic indicators, Trump’s economy is far outperforming what was projected if Obama’s policies remained entirely in effect.
Sorry Obama – you didn’t build that.
