Why did America swing back to the Democrats? It was the economy all along

At face value, it’s not all that complicated.

President Donald Trump and Republicans in Congress were elected in November 2024 to fix the economy. Now it’s November 2026, and Americans feel even worse about it than they did two years ago.

So, it’s the economy, stupid.

But with respect to James Carville , it’s not quite that simple.

America’s economy is in surprisingly good shape. Unemployment is low – low enough for economists to consider the US economy to be at “full employment.” Overall consumer spending , the bedrock of America’s economy, has remained mostly resilient. And the AI revolution has revved an economic engine so powerful it’s projected to become the largest spending boom in modern US history.

If the economy is so strong, what got Americans fed up with Republicans just two years after they voted them into power?

Inflation is back, and voters drew a straight line connecting Trump’s signature policies to their financial anxieties. Tariffs. Lax AI regulation. Strict immigration restrictions. And especially the Iran war .

“If it weren’t for the war in Iran, this would be a very different midterm election,” said Heather Long, chief economist at Navy Federal Credit Union.

Americans still haven’t adjusted to the significant jump in the price of … well, pretty much everything … since 2021.

Inflation had come back down to earth in the last year of Joe Biden’s presidency, but that wasn’t enough to convince voters to give Democrats another chance in 2024. And that anger about the high cost of living has festered throughout Trump’s return to office.

Still, Trump and Republicans had a fairly compelling economic story to tell in the early part of this year.

The US economy in January posted its best month of job gains since 2024.

Manufacturing jobs had turned positive for the first time in 14 months.

Big tax refunds from the Republican-passed One Big Beautiful Bill Act were starting to show up in bank accounts.

Mortgage rates had fallen below 6% for the first time in three years.

The stock market kept hitting record highs, buoyed by AI stocks.

Consumer inflation, which had hit a four-year nadir in April 2025, returned close to that low point in January and February 2026.

Then America went to war with Iran, and everything changed.

Christina House/Los Angeles Times/Getty Images

Oil prices surged to four-year highs . Diesel prices hit a record . And gas prices had never been this expensive on an Election Day.

Americans may hate inflation, but they get particularly irate about high fuel prices. Gas prices are plastered on giant billboards all over town, and filling a tank serves as a weekly reminder about how much more they’re shelling out: High gas and diesel prices alone have added $1,150 in costs for the average US household since the start of the war, according to Brown University researchers .

As fuel prices rose, bond yields surged, and so too did mortgage rates – recently rising at their fastest pace in three years.

After three straight years of paycheck gains outpacing price hikes, that trend kicked into reverse in March. Rebounding inflation has been eating into workers’ take-home pay ever since – and the average American’s real pay has shrunk since Trump has been back in office.

It’s not a surprise that Americans had fond memories of the economy under Trump’s first term. At every point during Trump 1.0, Americans’ hard-earned dollars stretched further than prices – their pay gains nearly doubled the pace of inflation throughout his first four years in office.

That’s why Americans polled by CNN in October 2024 favored Trump over Vice President Kamala Harris as a better custodian of the economy by 15 percentage points. No shock there: Biden’s net approval on the economy was -31 points in the final CNN poll taken before he dropped out of the race.

Trump’s marks are now worse than Biden’s. By a wide margin: His net approval on the economy is -46 points, according to an October CNN poll.

Trump 2.0 has been a completely different story than Trump 1.0. For many Americans, it seems like costs are spiraling out of control and the American Dream is unattainable.

The Trump administration and congressional Republicans have laid blame at Democrats’ feet for the poor state of financial affairs they inherited. But some of Trump’s policies – especially his unpopular war – clearly made Americans’ cost of living worse.

It’s not just gas prices, which have added about $75 a month to people’s expenses. It’s other costs that voters associate with Trump and the Republicans – some of which are adding hundreds of dollars a month to their bills.

Republicans’ failure to extend the Affordable Care Act enhanced subsidies in 2025 sent monthly Obamacare premiums up 58%, on average, for this year.

Electricity costs jumped 8.7% during Trump’s second term. Trump has been among the biggest champions of unfettered growth for AI.

Trump’s immigration policies and tariffs have raised the cost of auto repairs , which surged 12.3% since Trump took office.

They also sent homebuilders’ costs up by 13.3%.

Trump’s tariffs added $820 in taxes for the average American household this year, according to the Tax Foundation.

“Let’s say, for the sake of argument Biden totally screwed up: That in no way exonerates Trump,” said Steven Durlauf, an economist at the University of Chicago who researches wealth inequality and mobility. “Inflation has been badly managed by Trump. Voters have to place responsibility with the administration’s policies.”

All the evidence points to the voters doing just that. That’s a big reason why Trump’s Republican party took a beating in Tuesday’s midterm election.

Inflation is only part of the story. Many Americans feel like the economy has left them behind.

The K-shaped economy accounts for some of that: Wealthier Americans with money in the stock market and who own a home are significantly more immune to rising costs than less-affluent Americans who are increasingly living paycheck to paycheck .

A big part of the problem is the lack of available options to achieve the American Dream: A massive undersupply of childcare options and housing have priced out many folks and have denied access for some who can.

“The middle-class ideal is becoming increasingly unobtainable,” said Durlauf.

The same is becoming true of the job market. Although still relatively strong, jobs are by no means booming like they had been in the immediate post-pandemic years. Mass layoffs haven’t become the norm, but for folks without a job, applications feel like they’re going into the ether .

“Another way to say low-hire, low-fire job market is lack-of-opportunity job market,” Long said.

In this economy, many Americans just feel stuck.

表面上看，这并不复杂。

唐纳德·特朗普总统和国会共和党人在2024年11月当选，目标是重振经济。如今已是2026年11月，美国民众对此的感受却比两年前更加糟糕。

所以，笨蛋，问题出在经济上。

但就詹姆斯·卡维尔而言，事情并没有那么简单。

美国经济状况出人意料地好。失业率很低——低到经济学家认为美国经济已达到“充分就业”水平。作为美国经济基石的整体消费支出也保持了相当强的韧性。人工智能革命更是催生了一台动力强劲的经济引擎，预计将成为美国现代史上规模最大的消费繁荣。

如果经济如此强劲，为什么美国人在投票让共和党上台仅仅两年后就对他们感到厌倦了？

通货膨胀卷土重来，选民们将特朗普的标志性政策与他们的财务焦虑直接联系起来。关税、宽松的人工智能监管、严格的移民限制，尤其是伊朗战争。

“如果不是因为伊朗战争，这次中期选举将会非常不同，”海军联邦信贷联盟首席经济学家希瑟·朗表示。

自 2021 年以来，美国人仍然没有适应物价的大幅上涨……嗯，几乎所有东西的价格都上涨了。

在乔·拜登总统任期的最后一年，通货膨胀率已经回落，但这不足以说服选民在2024年再次给民主党人一次机会。而民众对高生活成本的愤怒情绪在特朗普重返总统职位后持续发酵。

不过，今年年初，特朗普和共和党人还是讲出了一个相当有说服力的经济故事。

美国经济1月份就业增长创下2024年以来的最佳单月纪录。

制造业就业人数14个月来首次转正。

共和党通过的《一项美好的大法案》带来的大额退税款项开始陆续到账。

抵押贷款利率三年来首次跌破6%。

受人工智能股票的提振，股市持续创下历史新高。

消费者通胀率在 2025 年 4 月跌至四年来的最低点，并在 2026 年 1 月和 2 月回升至接近该低点。

然后美国与伊朗开战，一切都改变了。

Christina House/洛杉矶时报/Getty Images

石油价格飙升至四年来的最高点。柴油价格创下历史新高。而且，在选举日，汽油价格从未如此昂贵。

美国人或许讨厌通货膨胀，但他们对高昂的燃油价格尤其愤怒。汽油价格的巨幅广告牌遍布全城，每次加油都会提醒他们又要多花多少钱：据布朗大学的研究人员称，自战争开始以来，仅汽油和柴油价格上涨一项就已使美国家庭平均支出增加了1150美元。

随着燃油价格上涨，债券收益率飙升，抵押贷款利率也随之上涨——最近以三年来最快的速度上涨。

在连续三年工资增长超过物价上涨之后，这一趋势在3月份开始逆转。此后，通胀反弹一直在蚕食工人的实际收入——自特朗普再次执政以来，美国人的平均实际收入有所下降。

美国人对特朗普第一任期内的经济抱有美好的回忆并不令人意外。在特朗普执政的头四年里，美国人辛辛苦苦挣来的钱总是比物价上涨更划算——他们的工资增长速度几乎是通货膨胀速度的两倍。

这就是为什么美国民众在2024年10月接受CNN民调时，认为特朗普比副总统卡马拉·哈里斯更适合掌管经济，支持率高出15个百分点。这并不令人意外：在拜登退出竞选前接受的最后一次CNN民调中，他对经济的净支持率为-31个百分点。

特朗普的支持率现在比拜登还低，而且差距很大：根据CNN 10月份的民调，他在经济方面的净支持率为-46个百分点。

特朗普2.0时代与特朗普1.0时代截然不同。对许多美国人来说，生活成本似乎正在失控地飙升，美国梦也变得遥不可及。

特朗普政府和国会共和党人将他们接手时糟糕的财政状况归咎于民主党人。但特朗普的一些政策——尤其是他那场不得人心的战争——显然加剧了美国人的生活成本。

不仅仅是汽油价格上涨，这已经让人们每月额外支出约75美元。还有其他一些与特朗普和共和党相关的费用——其中一些每月会让他们账单增加数百美元。

共和党人未能将《平价医疗法案》的补贴延长至 2025 年，导致今年奥巴马医改的月保费平均上涨了 58%。

特朗普第二个任期内，电力成本上涨了8.7%。特朗普一直是人工智能无限制发展的最大支持者之一。

特朗普的移民政策和关税政策提高了汽车维修成本，自特朗普上任以来，汽车维修成本已飙升 12.3%。

它们还导致房屋建筑商的成本上涨了 13.3%。

据税务基金会称，特朗普的关税政策今年给美国家庭平均增加了 820 美元的税款。

“假设拜登彻底搞砸了，但这绝不意味着特朗普就无罪，”芝加哥大学研究财富不平等和流动性的经济学家史蒂文·杜尔劳夫说。“特朗普对通货膨胀的处理非常糟糕。选民必须追究本届政府政策的责任。”

所有证据都表明选民们正是这么做的。这正是特朗普所在的共和党在周二的中期选举中惨败的重要原因。

通货膨胀只是问题的一部分。许多美国人感觉自己被经济发展抛在了后面。

K 型经济解释了其中的一些原因：拥有股票市场资金和房产的富裕美国人比越来越依赖工资收入的不太富裕的美国人更能抵御成本上涨的影响。

问题很大程度上在于缺乏实现美国梦的途径：托儿服务和住房的严重短缺导致许多人买不起房，也让一些有能力的人失去了机会。

“中产阶级的理想正变得越来越难以实现，”杜尔劳夫说。

就业市场也呈现出同样的趋势。虽然就业形势依然相对强劲，但远不及疫情初期那样繁荣。大规模裁员尚未成为常态，但对于失业者而言，他们的求职申请似乎石沉大海。

朗表示：“换句话说，低招聘、低解雇的就业市场就是缺乏就业机会的就业市场。”

在当前的经济形势下，许多美国人感到束手无策。