By AP News
Photos: YouTube Screenshots\Wikimedia Commons
Trump says it’s Biden’s economy, but businesses and economists beg to differ
When the stock market was climbing in January 2024, Donald Trump knew exactly who deserved credit: He did. When the stock market fell Wednesday on news that the American economy had gone backward during the first three months of 2025, Trump knew exactly who was to blame: Joe Biden. Read more.
Why this matters:
“This is Biden’s Stock Market, not Trump’s,’’ Trump posted. “Our Country will boom, but we have to get rid of the Biden ‘Overhang.’ This will take a while, has NOTHING TO DO WITH TARIFFS.”
Yet for economists puzzling out how prices and hiring will change in the coming months, or businesses struggling with a starkly uncertain future, Trump’s massive and unpredictable import taxes on almost every country do in fact bear much of the blame.
Trump has blown up the existing world trade system by slapping 10% import taxes – tariffs – on friends and foes alike. He’s plastered 145% tariffs on China, drawing retaliation from Beijing that threatens to end trade between the world’s two largest economies. He’s also hit foreign steel, aluminum and autos. The erratic way he’s rolled out his protectionist policies – introducing, then suspending, tariffs, then announcing new ones – has left companies, consumers and investors bewildered.
Trump’s attempt to shift blame for bad economic news to his predecessor raises a question: At what point in a four-year term does a new president assume responsibility for the economy’s performance? Georgia Tech University’s Mark Zachary Taylor, who studies the economic policies of the American presidents, notes that for a typical president, “it might take six months to two years for us to accurately call the economy ‘theirs.’”
