Politics | October 30th, 2024

Fact check: Did Donald Trump’s stimulus check help the US economy?

By: Cariane Geffrard | Online Editor

It’s complicated, but not really.  

“Biden has been in office for four years, and it feels like nothing has been good since Covid happened in 2020. And Trump, if he can stay out of jail to make it to the election, then we’ll see.”  

Those are the words of Florida A&M University general health science student Jocelyn Payne. At 21, Payne will vote in her first presidential election in November. However, Payne is unhappy with the candidates for various reasons. The most prominent being the economy.  

“The world has been downhill; there’s crime, prices are up, and people are stressed and depressed – including me,” Payne said.  

From groceries to gas in rural neighborhoods and large cities, Americans everywhere are wondering why prices are higher and if they will go down. Unfortunately, that isn’t happening. 

Inflation measures the rate of changes in the price of goods and services over a specific period. The US Bureau of Labor Statistics calculates this percentage by year.  

In the past four years, major world events (such as global supply chain issues from the pandemic, the war between Russia and Ukraine and the latest Israel-Hamas conflict) have contributed to the rise of inflation from 1.2% in 2020 to a whopping 8.0% in 2022.  

However, because of the three rounds of stimulus checks distributed by both the Trump and Biden administrations, the government avoided a major economic crisis, as the unemployment rate had risen to almost 15% during the pandemic. With the unemployment rate down to 4% in 2024, economists credit these relief packages, called the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act and the American Rescue Plan, for minimizing inflation to 3.3%.  

That being said, because of the amount of money released (especially in the final round), prices for goods rose, and many Americans couldn’t account for that. According to an interview between Santul Nerkar at FiveThirtyEight and economist Thomas Philippon, the last rounds of stimulus created excess demand that contributed to inflation. 

“One reason it’s particularly painful in the U.S. is that prices were already high, people’s purchasing power, the real value of their wages was already being eroded by market power before. Then, when you add to that a burst of inflation, it’s even more painful,” Philippon said.  

Some Republicans have blamed Biden for passing the American Rescue Plan and being the sole contributor to inflation while praising Trump for passing the first two rounds. Yet, by that logic, Trump could face scrutiny for actively fighting – even going so far as to threaten not to sign the bill – for an increase of the initial stimulus checks from $600 to $2,000. (This increase did not happen because of Republicans in the Senate’s concerns over the bill’s cost.)   

Still, on social media, some are beginning to agree with the Republicans.  

Viral hip-hop sensation Sexyy Red started a conversation amongst the African American community about her views on Donald Trump. Red supported Trump’s candidacy on “This Past Weekend,” a podcast by comedian Theo Voy.  

“I like Trump. Yeah, they support him in the hood… They thought he was racist and against women, but once he started getting Black people out of jail and giving people that free money, aw baby, we love Trump. We need him back in office,” Red said.   

While this video sparked outrage, Red’s comments also raised some support from other Black Americans.  

One video by @theylove.shanya on TikTok garnered 672,000 likes for audio by Internet celebrity Shamar Marco. “I’m team trunk [Trump]” with the caption “me after trump said stimulus checks for evb [everybody] 18+ if he wins the election.” While the post’s caption stated she was joking, similar videos with that audio echo that sentiment and have tens of thousands of likes. On an app like TikTok, where most of the target audience are members of Generation Z – a bulk of which will most likely be first-time voters in this presidential election – misinformation like that is dangerous.  

As a member of Gen Z, Payne finds these jokes to be in poor taste, whether they have truth in them or not.  

“I think you should vote for who has our best interests for the future, for your kids, and for your kids’ kids – you can’t just vote for somebody because they’re giving you a little bit of money,” Payne continued. “Money that isn’t even worth anything these days… We have a lot of big problems that we need to worry about instead of a few hundred dollars.” 

According to the Pew Research Center, many Americans seem to agree with her. 

When Biden was running for reelection, one in four Americans held an unfavorable view of both candidates for the 2024 election year. The second-highest time this happened was during the 2016 election between Donald Trump and Hilary Clinton, where one in five Americans viewed both candidates as unfavorable.  

The Pew Research Center also found that 73% of registered voters criticize the US economic system, especially for being unfairly skewed towards corporations with vested interests.  

With statistics like these, an air of exhaustion looms around this year’s election, stemming partly from voters’ views on how the American government uses money.  

Regardless, early polls suggest the election will be close. With less than a month before Election Day, the 2024 presidential election will be historic.