This is something I’ve been thinking about myself since the November election. What actual metrics can be used to reckon Donald Trump’s success or failure?
The contributors at Bloomberg View offer seventeen different ideas:
- Number of U. S. manufacturing jobs
- Civilian labor force in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, and Wisconsin
- Labor force participation rate of less-educated prime age men
- Babies named Donald (the popularity of the name has decline sharply since 1940 after years of stability—my father-in-law’s name was Donald)
- Number of Google searches containing the search terms “move to Canada”
- Betting markets’ odds on Trump resignation
- Right track, wrong track opinion polls
- The Dow plus his approval rating (call it the “Sunstein index”)
- Number of children who die in the Syrian civil war
- Federal deficit as percentage of GDP
- Trade deficit
- Cash held by major tech sector companies offshore
- Number of federal regulations
- Home prices in Washington, DC
- Number of Google searches containing the search term “Bannon”
- Real median income
- Number of Bloomberg View headlines including the word “Trump”
To those I’d add
- Number of Americans killed in terrorist attacks and
- Number of American soldiers killed in war and
- Number of Chicago homicides and
the only somewhat facetious
- Number of nuclear weapons used offensively or defensively
In all seriousness, what metrics could be used to measure the Trump Administration’s success or failure?
Funny how none of those metrics have to do with Trump’s signature issues of immigration and ending corruption, and how many come down to money.
I’ll add:
– Number of women who are seriously injured or die obtaining back-alley abortions.
– Whether Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia are still free countries.
– Suicide rates for gay and transgender people.
– Number of families broken apart by ICE enforcement.
– Number of people who die from loss of Obamacare.
– Number of hate crimes.
– Air and water pollution indices.
– Number of federal prisoners.
– Global rankings on press freedom.
– Global rankings on liberty.
– How many allies start edging closer to China as the more stable global force.
– How many wives Trump goes through in 4 years.
– How many times we see the word, “Pence” in headlines.
Oh, and add:
– Percentage of American tourists abroad who pretend to be Canadian.
I would agree with a lot of those, Michael. It should be pointed out that based on Reporters Without Borders press freedom index the freedom of the press in the U. S. has declined sharply over the last 15 years and particularly during the last four.
The press here is still rated as free but apparently not as free as we used to be.
Dave:
That’s all about Snowden and Manning. Reporters Without Borders favors leaks of national security materials, I generally do not, and I don’t think it says anything about freedom of the press. The press has not suffered under Obama, the leakers have.
I’d love to see a counterpart to that group that calculated press accuracy.
So far that has proven a bit elusive. The many fact-checking sites that have sprung up have exhibited a tendency to become opinion-checking sites. When one month something is rated “Mostly true” and the next month “Mostly false” and nothing has changed except the fact-checkers understanding, that’s a problem.
Number of times a famous fiction writer:
– pouts
– calls people he dislikes poopie heads and meanies
– stomps his feet
– holds his breath
– says he hates the deplorables and wishes they would die
– refuses to move out to one of the countries he admires (the xenophobic and racist ones that have exceedingly high standards unlike the US)
With Progressives histrionics, this is going to be the best four years. I wish I had voted for Trump. I should buy some stock in footie pajamas, cocoa, bubbles, play dough, stuffed animals, and playpens.
Here is another:
– number of progressives who set themselves on fire in protest
– number who are successful
Tasty:
Thanks for calling me ‘famous.’ But actually I am I would say high midlist. My wife is significantly more well-known but I’m not sure she qualifies as famous, either, and would be appalled by the suggestion.
As to the substance, thank you as well for admitting that support for Trump is primarily about hurting other people. Spite. Not perhaps the most admirable emotion.
Its a political office, and so the metrics should be political. Is he re-elected? Are Congressional Republicans punished in 2018? Does he move the Overton window on various issues (perhaps on trade, immigration or industrial policy?), including among Democrats? Is he able to cobble together some bipartisan legislation? Do Republican politicians shift their discourse from free-market boosterism towards economic populism? Is he impeached? Does he resign? Is anyone in his cabinet indicted?
Job approval and favorability ratings are probably important here, but apparently not as much as usual.
The economic question is always simply ‘are you better off today than 4 years ago?’ A lot of those metrics bounced back since the last recession, so the ones that might matter are the ones haven’t bounced back: labor force participation rate, real median household income, food stamp dependence, household debt, and homeownership rates (the last need to to stop declining, not bounce back to the last housing bubble).
Metrics with finer granularity would make ongoing evaluation possible.
IMO an important metric would be closing the gap of hostility between races, gender and classes. This would happen because his performance and actions prove to improve the lives of the middle class; offer better education, upward mobility, self confidence in struggling neighborhoods; disarm disingenuous gender bias; create a health care system that is more equitable, suitable, offering more choices to the people being insured/served; decrease political intolerances; support free speech of dissenting opinions.
I believe improving the emotional climate around the country, taking pompous posturing less seriously, along with soaring rhetoric and intellectual arrogance will give way to role models involving merit, words having genuine empathy for the less fortunate, and actions that take root.
IMO an important metric would be closing the gap of hostility between races, gender and classes.
Well-timed. The sun just came out, and I need to get to work and nothing sends me on my way like a good laugh.
I’m pretty sure that’s what his alt-right, neo-Nazi, KKK supporters are looking for, too: better race and gender relationships.
Also, if you chose to call a newly installed president a “pig,” it’s not only an ungracious remark, but only serves to scar the opening salvos of a brand new page without even bothering to read it first.
Michael, your comments are hysterically over the top, much like some of those fringe right, small-minded KKK people acted towards Obama. Slashing at people with slurrs only poisons the public well further.
“Metric” refers to something that can be measured. How would you go about measuring that? Number of hate crimes, suggested by Michael, would be one way but only at the extremes.
By which you mean the people who voted with you. You may not like it, but the KKK, and the neo-Nazis and the butcher of Aleppo Vladimir Putin, all backed your deeply corrupt, unqualified, incompetent candidate.
And you voted for the candidate they all love. And now supposedly you want racial and gender reconciliation? As your newly-minted president is dreaming of a Hispanic Trail of Tears and deciding which White House staffers to grab by the pussy? Right.
Number of men who adopt his hair style.
Number of men who turn orange.
Which major entitlement program is reformed, if any
The passage of any bill that doesn’t actually benefit the Trump family in any way
Number of coal mines reopened
Number of people here on visas
Number of deaths due to narcotic overdoses
Business investments
MIchael- Some pretty bad roads in coal country. Lots of deer too. Might want to have a cow catcher on the new car.
Steve
How about election results in November, 2018?
No business would wait two years before evaluating how it was doing. More frequent measuring of results is necessary.
That having been said if the Republicans gain seats in the House in the 2018 midterms, it will be time for Democrats to panic. That would be bucking the trend which is that the president’s party loses seats in the midterms.
The Senate is a different story. We are unlikely to learn much from the midterms there. Although I expect we’ll see a lot of pirouetting by Democrats running for re-election in states carried by Trump in 2016.
“No business would wait two years…”.
Why not? Consequences, of course. The only consequences for government happen in November in even numbered years.
Setting aside the facetious proposed measures I’m less sanguine about the efficacy of the metrics cited. Some, sure. But so many suffer from measurement error, multiple cause and effect problems or disconnected cause and effect. False precision.
I think regardless of the metric, people will see what they want to see. If this election season has taught us anything, it’s that the human capacity for self delusion is just about endless.
Metrics are ostensibly objective measures, but there’s so much fudging of the numbers that the metrics are nearly useless.