Trump's Hollow Man GDP: Not with a bang but a whimper

 Trump: Our Country Is Booming, Despite Being In A "Mini War"

 

The consequences of the Reagan Revolution: $11.1 trillion missing real GDP since 1Q1984

 Real GDP in 1Q2026 reached $24.175 trillion.

Had real GDP continued to grow at the pre-1984 rate to now, it would have been $35.273 trillion, 46% more than it is.

That's the difference between a compound annual growth rate from 1947 to 1984 at 3.585% continued to 2026 instead of at 2.657% since 1984 to now.

IDEAS HAVE CONSEQUENCES. 

 

Real GDP for 1Q2026 was reported today at 2.0% seasonally adjusted annual rate, and it continues to underperform both the Reagan era and the post-war era

It's a long way down from 8.1% in 1Q1984 to 2.0% in 1Q2026. 

GDPC1 compound annual growth rates:

Trump era to now 1Q2017-1Q2026: 2.476%

Mid-Reagan era to Trump 1Q1984-1Q2017: 2.707%

Post-war to Reagan 1Q1947-1Q1984: 3.585%

Trump underperforms the post-war by 31% . . . and Reagan by 9%. MAGA is purely aspirational.

Reagan to Trump underperformed the post-war by 24%.

The compound annual growth rate of real GDP from Reagan to now is 2.657%, underperforming the post-war by 26%.

This is why the kids don't have full-time jobs, kids of their own, and homes to raise them in.

 

trend for percent change for real dollars

trend for percent change for the rate

 

Post-Reagan GDP underperformed the immediate post-war by over 26%, Trump-era GDP underperforms it by almost 32%

Ronald Reagan didn't make America great again, and neither has Trump.

The watershed tax changes throwing away the threat of high ordinary income taxation under Reagan in 1986 and Trump in 2018 have got to go.

The country needs genuinely domestic, long-term investment to bring back economic growth. Reward that with low tax incentives and penalize everything else.

Rich people OBVIOUSLY haven't demonstrated that they know best what to do with their own money, otherwise they would have done it already.

We watched helplessly year after year, especially after 2000, as one business after another moved its production abroad seeking lower labor and regulatory costs to make themselves rich, not us.

We have to make them reverse it, because they aren't going to do it otherwise. Tax the shit out of them until they do the right thing, and keep the threat of taxes hanging over their heads to keep them doing the right thing. 

Real GDP Compound Annual Growth Rates

GDPCA 9 April 2026

1947-1984: 3.638%

1984-2017: 2.679%

2017-2025: 2.476%

 

Real GDP for 4Q2025 was revised lower to 0.5% from 0.7% last month in today's final estimate, and CNBC buried the story of a stalling economy

 The 0.5% estimate is the annual rate of real GDP growth in 4Q, and the figure doesn't sound like much of a revision until you remember that the estimated annual rate in 3Q was 4.4%.

That's one hell of a drop, whether it's to 0.7% or to 0.5%.

In other words, the economy nearly stalled in 4Q. 

Meanwhile real GDP for full year 2025 increased at a measly 2.1% rate. 

CNBC buried the bad news in a different story, seven paragraphs down:

Inflation held sticky at 3% as U.S. headed into war with Iran, key Fed gauge shows

... Separately, the Commerce Department reported that economic growth was even slower than previously reported for the fourth quarter of 2025. 

Gross domestic product, a measure of all goods and services produced, rose just 0.5% on a seasonally adjusted annualized rate, down from the prior reading of 0.7% and the initial estimate of 1.4%. The full-year growth rate held at 2.1%.

The department said the downward revision came primarily to lower investment than previously indicated. ...

Gee, I thought Trump said $18 trillion in investment was flowing into the economy?

Golden Age, my foot. 

Meanwhile the initial estimate was cut in half by the second estimate, and the final estimate cut that by nearly 29% more. They were off by only 64% in the end. 

Remember, this is all pre-Iran-War-induced oil crisis, too.

It's going to be ugly. 

 

 

SPX/GDP, then vs. now

SPX(average annual)/GDP(trillions of dollars), then vs. now

1938: 131

1942: 52

1964/1965: 118 

1982: 35

2000: 139 

2009: 65

2019: 135 

2025: 202

Median 1938-2019: 81

This ratio has been above 139 for six consecutive years 2020-2025, which is unprecedented for the era shown. Even so, return places third because dividends are puny in the age of obscenely overpaid dirty rotten CEOs and management.

Return: nominal/real, average per annum, dividends fully reinvested

12/1942-12/1965: 15.43%/12.30%

12/1982-12/2000: 16.66/12.97

12/2009-12/2025: 14.09/11.23 

 

 

Ronald Reagan didn't make America great again, and neither has Trump

 Ronald Reagan didn't make America great again, and neither has Trump. 

Real GDP Compound Annual Growth Rates

1947-1984: 3.652% 

1984-2017: 2.675% 

2017-2025: 2.416%

 

 

That right there is a stagflation headline

 Fourth-quarter GDP revised down to just 0.7% growth; January core inflation was 3.1%

Economic growth was much slower than expected in the final three months of 2025 while core inflation rose to start 2026, the Commerce Department reported Friday. ...

The first revision of the GDP reading was a sharp step down from the previous estimate of 1.4% and well below the Dow Jones consensus forecast for 1.5%. It also marked a considerable slowdown from the 4.4% gain in the prior period. For the full year, GDP posted a 2.1% increase, or one-tenth of a percentage point lower than the previous reading. In 2024, the economy rose at a 2.8% pace. ...

On the inflation side, readings for January were mostly in line with estimates, though they showed price increases running well ahead of where the Federal Reserve would like. ...  

      

Core pce inflation has been range-bound around 3% since Dec 2023. For 2009 through 2020 it averaged half that, 1.5%.

The compound annual rate of real GDP growth since 2017 has been 2.416%, almost 34% lower than the post-war rate for 1947 through 1984 of 3.652%.

The rate for 1984 through 2017, also using today's data, was 2.675%, also higher than the rate since the Trump tax reform eight years ago.

Trump has not made America great again, any more than Reagan did. 

 

 

Current GDP supports SPX at mean value 2550

 31.49007 x 81

Trump real GDP 2017-2025 underperforms 1929-1984, which includes The Great Depression, by 30.4%

 GDPCA CAGR

1929-1984: 3.569%

2017-2025: 2.483% 

GDP in 2025 would be double what it is had economic growth continued after 1984 at the 1929-1984 compound annual rate of 6.869%

 Nominal GDP in 2025 would be $61.524 trillion instead of $30.778 trillion had economic growth continued at the 55-year 1929-1984 compound annual rate of 6.869%.

That's the difference the 26% reduction in the growth rate to 5.079% has made in the 41 years since 1984.

The compound annual growth rate since the Trump tax reform from 2017 has been slightly, but not a lot, better at 5.795% on an annual basis. Measured 4Q on 4Q over the 8 years the compound annual rate is a little better still at 5.814%. 

Meanwhile the seasonally adjusted annual rate of real GDP growth fell from 4.4% in 3Q2025 to 1.4% in 4Q2025 in today's report: 

Fourth-quarter U.S. GDP rose just 1.4%, badly missing estimate; inflation firms at 3%

American leadership continues to avoid the elephant in the living room of economic growth.

1984 marked the turn, contrary to Ronald Reagan, when America's best days truly were behind her, and economic growth then hit the big brick wall after 2007 and nothing anyone has done has fixed it.

In the 78 years to 2007 nominal GDP (GDPA) grew at a compound annual rate of 6.525%, but only at 4.281% in the 18 years since then.

The corresponding real values are 3.448%, and . . . just 1.982%.

Yes, that's right. Real GDP (GDPCA) has been growing at sub-2% since 2007. 

Politicians who talk up economic growth aspire to better days but do not deliver.

The first step to authentic economic recovery means admitting that you have a problem. 

 

Nancy Pelosi's Speakerships were a double-whammy of obscene spending unprecedented in the post-war which never delivered on the economic growth

The double whammy burger you order never looks as good as the picture.

 

Why everything sucks since the Great Recession: Real GDP in the 18 years since 2007 has been growing at a compound annual rate of just 2.004%

 The compound annual growth rate before that, for the 60 years from 1947 to 2007, was 3.469%.

We're doing 42% worse.

It's uncanny.

 

 

We're already close to the first: As of Feb 2026, the average interest rate on the U.S. National Debt is 3.4% while the compound annual rate of nominal GDP growth from 3Q2007 to 3Q2025 is only 4.3%

 One path to U.S. fiscal disaster is most alarming — and most likely

... An Everest of debt is an incentive for an inflation crisis to reduce the value of existing debt by paying lenders with debased dollars. But inflation would become baked into the expectations of investors, who would demand higher interest rates. Then R>G would bite: When interest rates paid on debt exceed the rate of economic growth, a crisis intensifies as rising interest rates depress economic growth. ... The most probable, and most ominous, outcome would be a gradual crisis. ... Nothing unsettles a middle-class nation more rapidly than inflation, a component of all of these crises. ...

Fed Chairman Jerome Powell says economic activity has been solid lol

 10-year Treasury yield rises after Fed keeps rates steady, notes ‘solid’ economy

... “Available indicators suggest that economic activity has been expanding at a solid pace. Job gains have remained low, and the unemployment rate has shown some signs of stabilization,” the post-meeting statement said. “Inflation remains somewhat elevated.” ... 

“I think, and many of my colleagues think, it’s hard to look at the incoming data and say the policy is significantly restrictive at this time,” Fed Chair Jerome Powell said in a press conference. ...

The economy should be three times the size it is, $90.4 trillion in GDP instead of $31.1 trillion.

 

 

$59.31753 trillion to be exact

 

Today's GDP report indicates Trump GDP since 2017 is undershooting post-war performance up to Reagan 3Q1984 by 25%

 GDP since Reagan 3Q1984 (41 years) through the Trump present moment has grown at a compound annual rate 35% lower than for 3Q1947-3Q1984 (37 years): 5.076% vs. 7.847%.

Trump GDP CAGR since 3Q2017 (8 years): 5.878% (25% lower than the post-war to 3Q1984).

$4.08425 trillion GDP after 41-years at a compound annual growth rate of 7.847% would be $90.41555 trillion in 3Q2025 instead of $31.09802 trillion, 2.90 times more.

That's why you feel poorer. 

Reagan didn't make America great again, and neither has Trump.