Biden’s “Fastest-Growing Economy” Claim Is Patently Wrong – During an appearance on ABC’s late-night show Jimmy Kimmel Live!, U.S. President Joe Biden claimed that the United States economy is the fastest growing in the world.
The claim, however, doesn’t hold up to even basic scrutiny.
“Look, here’s where we are,” the president said. “We have the fastest-growing economy in the world. The world. The world.”
Biden’s comments were not challenged by the host, Jimmy Kimmel, on his claim.
The president’s repeated insistence throughout the interview also seemed to reflect the White House’s ongoing efforts to better “communicate” the president’s achievements during his first 17 months in office. Facing record-low approval ratings amid rising inflation, the president faces an uphill battle to help his party maintain control of Congress in November’s mid-term elections.
Telling untruths, however, is unlikely to help – and even legacy media outlets reported on the president’s wildly inaccurate claim.
The United States economy grew by 5.7% in 2021 – the latest data available until the 2022 fiscal year ends – but at least 50 other economies saw larger growth that same year. Data from the International Monetary Fund show that many of the economies with faster growth in 2021 were developing countries – but several are also considered first-world.
Poland matched the United States at 5.7% in 2021, while Romania beat the United States by 0.2 percentage points.
Turkey’s economy also grew by 11%.
Was President Biden Confused?
If the president wasn’t lying, he may have misspoke.
When asked for comment on the president’s claims on Friday, a White House official noted that the 5.7% economic growth in the U.S. economy was the fastest the country has seen since 1984.
However, the president’s repeated use of the term “the world” during the Kimmel interview seemed to suggest that he was fully aware of what he was saying.
“Catastrophic Economy”
Famed economist Art Laffer told Fox News’ “Mornings with Maria” on Friday that the newly-released May Consumer Price Index report was the “worst news of all” for President Joe Biden.
After the latest report showed inflation reaccelerating, rising to 8.6% over April’s 8.3% spike, Laffer warned that inflation isn’t peaking as Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen suggested it would – but accelerating.
“Inflation is not only not peaking and not coming down, it is accelerating,” Laffer said.
“And this is the worst news of all the Biden administration could have. And when you combine that with the GDP decline in the first quarter by 1.5%, and now the forecast for the second quarter out of Atlanta is only 9/10 of 1% growth. That’s atrocious. Total employment today is 800,000 people lower than it was in February 2020.”
Laffer insisted that today’s economic situation is “not a recovery” as the president says, and that it’s “not even a catch-up back to where we were before.”
“This is a catastrophic economy,” Laffer said.
Jack Buckby is a British author, counter-extremism researcher, and journalist based in New York. Reporting on the U.K., Europe, and the U.S., he works to analyze and understand left-wing and right-wing radicalization, and reports on Western governments’ approaches to the pressing issues of today. His books and research papers explore these themes and propose pragmatic solutions to our increasingly polarized society.
