There are worrying trends in the United States economy, especially in the last six months.
Here are some basic measures.
House Prices: After recovering post-COVID-19, median house prices in the USA have dropped by about 7% since the start of 2023.
Median Sales Price of Houses Sold for the United States (MSPUS) | FRED | St. Louis Fed
Total Car Sales: Car sales in the USA rocketed after COVID-19. They have dropped on an annualized basis by 15% in just five months.
Total Vehicle Sales (TOTALSA) | FRED | St. Louis Fed
Used Car Prices: Used car sales and prices are a key indicator of the state of the economy as they are a direct measure of how the poor and lower middle class are fairing. Here are used car prices in the USA. These prices exploded by 63% in the four years after COVID-19. Prices have dropped by 15% just in the last six months.
If these trends continue, the US economy will stagnate as housing and cars are the foundation of that economy. So far, this is not happening. Regardless of these trends, basic measures of economic performance are still holding up.
Here they are.
Unemployment Rate: The US unemployment rate is holding around 4%. This is excellent, and near the natural rate of unemployment. If you want a job in America, you can likely find one.
The Employment Situation - June 2025
Labour Force Participation: After plummeting in COVID-19 to about 60%, this rate has recovered, and remains steady just over 62%, although it has not yet recovered to its pre-COVID-19 level.
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CIVPART
Inflation: The Trump Tariff Terror threatens to raise inflation as tariff costs are passed on to US consumers. So far there is scant evidence of that, with the rate of inflation only rising from 2.3% in the spring, to 2.7% in June.
https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/inflation-cpi
Personal Debt: The proportion of annual income that is devoted to debt repayment has risen slightly to just over 11%, but is still nowhere near to its historic peak of over 15% in 2008. Those who preach about the perils of debt may be off base. Still, with higher interest rates, this could become more of a problem over time.
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/TDSP
Conclusion:....
Trump's management of the economy may be causing ripples in terms of a loss of confidence in places, and there is some cause for worry in the automobile and housing markets, but so far there is almost no evidence that he is having a negative impact on the US economy.
(P.S. I know many of my readers want me to pillory the guy. Sorry, the evidence simply isn't there.)
