How much can a president impact the economy? Top economist Mark Zandi breaks it down.

Most Americans put the economy at or near the top of the list of issues for deciding which presidential candidate to vote for. There is a lot to think about. So let’s consider several common questions regarding the election and the economy.

Yes, presidents and their policies matter. While the economy is buffeted by many forces outside the control of presidents, their policies are consequential. Most vitally in times of crisis. Both President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump should be applauded for helping the economy weather the massive blow from the COVID-19 pandemic. Trump provided some $3 trillion in support and Biden $2 trillion. All of this was financed by more government borrowing, which added to the nation’s heavy debt load, but without the funds, the economy would have struggled to recover. The hit to the government’s fiscal situation likely would have been even more devastating.

Biden’s pandemic relief response has been criticized for being too large, since it came later in the pandemic and is blamed for the high inflation plaguing much of this term. That’s unfair. It was unclear at the time how the pandemic would play out, and blame for the high inflation rests with the pandemic, which badly scrambled global supply chains and upended the job market.

Of course, how much presidents accomplish depends on the makeup of Congress. Both Trump and Biden controlled Congress early in their terms and seized the opportunity. Trump passed a $2 trillion tax cut for corporations and individuals. Biden has ramped up spending on roads, bridges, and other infrastructure, incentivized more R&D and semiconductor investment, and provided tax breaks to supercharge the clean energy transition.

Trump also used executive orders to skirt Congress more than any modern president to make policy changes with big economic implications. He rescinded U.S. involvement in the Paris Climate Accord, ended involvement in a free trade deal with Pacific-rim nations that excluded China, and increased tariffs on China and other trading partners. Biden has also used executive orders, albeit much less so and with modest economic consequence.

There’s a lot of political bombast on the campaign trail, but listen carefully as both Biden and Trump have essentially done as president what they said they would do.

Candidate Trump said in 2016 that he would erect a border wall with Mexico, raise tariffs on many of our trading partners, forcefully engage China, reduce regulations on fossil fuel production and the financial system, and cut taxes.

Candidate Biden said in 2020 that he would invest in the nation’s infrastructure and increase funding for education, for health care, and to address climate change.

They both did that, so listen to what they are saying now.

Trump is talking about even larger tariffs on all our trading partners, mass deportation of unauthorized immigrants, more corporate tax cuts, rolling back tax breaks for electric vehicles and clean energy, and having a say in interest rate decisions by the Federal Reserve.

Biden is talking about scaling back tax cuts for corporations and wealthier individuals, a bigger tax break for families with children, funds to support building more affordable housing and eldercare, and tighter regulation on big banks.

Analyzing Trump and Biden’s first terms is not as helpful as you might imagine. Of course, the script is still being written on Biden’s term, but even abstracting from this, any answer is complicated by the pandemic, which created chaos in Trump’s last year as president and Biden’s first year. The Russian war in Ukraine also caused serious economic damage in year two of Biden’s term.

Perhaps the best way to compare the economy’s performance under the two presidents is to compare 2019, three years into Trump’s term and before the pandemic, with 2023, three years into Biden’s term and largely after major economic impacts of the pandemic and Russian war.

But here’s the thing: The economy performed well in both those years.

In 2019, the economy posted strong GDP and job gains and unemployment was low at below 4%. The stock market had a good year, and house prices were on the rise.

In 2023, the economy also grew strongly, unemployment was steadfastly low, and stocks and housing posted big gains.

Inflation has been higher under Biden than Trump, but even after accounting for inflation, the typical Americans’ incomes rose more quickly in 2023 than in 2019. Even comparing Philadelphia’s economic performance, it’s a draw.

Thus, using the economy’s past performance to gauge whether Biden or Trump would be the better steward of the economy in the future is not especially helpful. I will take this question up in forthcoming columns.