Why We Hate Rising Prices More Than We Fear Losing Our Jobs
If you listen to Americans right now, you’ll be forgiven for thinking that when it comes to the economy, Joe Biden is the worst American president since Herbert Hoover. Every new poll seems worse than the last, and according to the polling-analysis site FiveThirtyEight, Biden has the lowest approval rating at this point in his presidency of any postwar president. Fewer than one in seven Americans think the country is on the right track, and most of those who think it’s on the wrong track seem to hold Biden responsible.
We all know the main reason for this, of course: inflation. Americans , and high gas prices in and gas prices hovering around even after a recent drop, it was inevitable that Biden’s popularity would take a big hit. But a recent poll from CNBC, , suggests that the president’s problems run deeper than that. The survey showed, naturally, that Americans were upset about inflation and Biden’s failure or inability to do anything about it. But it also included this perplexing result: People for whom jobs were the biggest concern said they favored control of Congress by a 54–31 margin. And that was a bigger margin for the GOP than it enjoyed among those for whom the cost of living was the biggest concern.
