# We'll need a "Trump's Economy Wall" on the mall when this is over **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [May 7, 2020, 11:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-need-a-trumps-economy-wall-on-the-mall-when-this-is-over/853321 "2020-05-07T11:08:42Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2020, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-need-a-trumps-economy-wall-on-the-mall-when-this-is-over/853321/41 "2020-05-12T16:17:17Z")
> [@puddleglum](#): > > If you look around the world, many countries and many different leaders are having worse outcomes than the US. That shows that the problem is not unique to the US unlike Trump who is. Many countries, like SK and Germany, are doing much, much better, because of superior leadership and decision making. Furthermore, they’ve been much more successful without decimating their economies – because they’ve provided much more assistance in the meantime (as well as reducing the deaths – and deaths are bad for the economy). I’m angry because the government has done such a shitty job, and this has lead to more deaths and more economic decimation. You should be too. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2020, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-need-a-trumps-economy-wall-on-the-mall-when-this-is-over/853321/42 "2020-05-12T17:21:09Z")
> [@puddleglum](#): > > If you look around the world, many countries and many different leaders are having worse outcomes than the US. You’re wrong. No country has had a worse outcome than the United States. No leader has done a worse job than Donald Trump. I cited the numbers. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2020, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-need-a-trumps-economy-wall-on-the-mall-when-this-is-over/853321/43 "2020-05-15T01:08:20Z")
> [@puddleglum](#): > > A tabletop role playing game? I had no idea that boardgames could stop pandemics. I guess I should have remembered how Chutes and Ladders stopped the swine flu epidemic. I’m not even gonna waste any more of my time on someone who posts something this deliberately obtuse. Nice no longer knowing you. ---
**Author:** ![Buck\_Godot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/buck_godot/32/6573_2.png) [@Buck\_Godot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Buck_Godot)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2020, 1:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-need-a-trumps-economy-wall-on-the-mall-when-this-is-over/853321/44 "2020-05-15T01:24:49Z")
> [@puddleglum](#): > > So it is Trump’s fault US has 30 times the population of Belgium? The reason Belgium has a much larger Covid 19 case load is that they are using a [different metric](https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-52491210) than the rest of the world in how they count cases. Rather than counting confirmed cases, they are counting suspected cases along with confirmed cases. ---
**Author:** ![puddleglum](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puddleglum/32/137_2.png) [@puddleglum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puddleglum)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2020, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-need-a-trumps-economy-wall-on-the-mall-when-this-is-over/853321/45 "2020-05-15T16:07:34Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > Many countries, like SK and Germany, are doing much, much better, because of superior leadership and decision making. Furthermore, they’ve been much more successful without decimating their economies – because they’ve provided much more assistance in the meantime (as well as reducing the deaths – and deaths are bad for the economy). > > I’m angry because the government has done such a shitty job, and this has lead to more deaths and more economic decimation. You should be too. The government has done a bad job, but the focus on one man obscures what the actual problems are. The amount of regulations imposed is to slow decisions down and make sure something like thalidomide can’t happen. Every action by the government has to go through an obstacle course before anything can be done. Multiple layers have to sign off and there are lots of veto points and bottlenecks. In normal times it makes government frustrating to deal with. It is the reason new drugs cost 2 billion dollars each, why it takes more time and money to build infrastructure than it did 100 years ago, and why high speed rail is impossible. In an actual crisis it goes from frustrating to deadly. That is why tests were delayed, the reason information could not be shared between hospitals, why masks could not be imported, etc. It is a failure of the regulatory state that has been building for 60 years. Blaming Trump for all this is like saying it is the captain’s fault a cruise ship is not as fast as a cigarette boat. ---
**Author:** ![puddleglum](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puddleglum/32/137_2.png) [@puddleglum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puddleglum)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2020, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-need-a-trumps-economy-wall-on-the-mall-when-this-is-over/853321/46 "2020-05-15T16:08:53Z")
> [@Buck\_Godot](#): > > The reason Belgium has a much larger Covid 19 case load is that they are using a [different metric](https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-52491210) than the rest of the world in how they count cases. Rather than counting confirmed cases, they are counting suspected cases along with confirmed cases. That is one of the reasons why it is impossible to state with confidence which country is doing the best or the worst. ---
**Author:** ![Velocity](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/velocity/32/18006_2.png) [@Velocity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Velocity)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2020, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-need-a-trumps-economy-wall-on-the-mall-when-this-is-over/853321/47 "2020-05-15T17:08:50Z")
Regardless of whether Trump is “among the worst” or “THE worst,” it’s pretty much indisputable that his response has been utterly dishonest (“I knew it was a pandemic before anyone else did”) and bungled. I cannot think of a president that has been gifted more and done less with it than Trump. He was gifted a strong economy but insisted on devoting airtime to other unpopular topics instead, thus dragging down his popularity. Then he was gifted an opportunity to make everyone forget about impeachment, scandal, etc. by turning in a strong performance on Covid - had he done well, he could have made this the Covid election, and won on the strength of his good handling of a crisis - and he bungles that as well. It’s like giving a golfer countless mulligans, and he screws each and every single one up. Like a football team that can’t get a first down despite being given a 5th, 6th, 7th down to get those ten yards. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2020, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-need-a-trumps-economy-wall-on-the-mall-when-this-is-over/853321/48 "2020-05-15T17:44:59Z")
> [@puddleglum](#): > > That is one of the reasons why it is impossible to state with confidence which country is doing the best or the worst. So your argument now is that the number of confirmed cases we now have might be smaller if we added the number of suspected cases to the number of confirmed cases? You’re disputing how addition works? ---
**Author:** ![asahi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asahi/32/8693_2.png) [@asahi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asahi)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2020, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-need-a-trumps-economy-wall-on-the-mall-when-this-is-over/853321/49 "2020-05-15T18:15:42Z")
> **[Retail sales plunge a record 16.4% in April, far worse than predicted](https://www.cnbc.com/2020/05/15/us-retail-sales-april-2020.html)** > > The biggest factor in the downturn was a collapse in clothing and accessories that amounted to an 89.3% fall from a year ago. > [@](#): > > Retail sales fell 16.4% in April, far worse than the 12.3% predicted. > > Damage was felt across the board, with clothing stores faring worst and grocers showing the only gains. > > Restaurants lagged badly as did service stations The biggest name on Trump’s Economy Memorial will be the American middle class, which will be reduced to a heap of jobs that used to exist and probably won’t come back for at least a year. Some jobs will never come back. I’ll say it again: we’re already moving away from v-shape recession/recovery - that ship has sailed. It’s just a question of whether this becomes the Great Recession II or the Great Depression II. I’d say we’re rapidly approaching the latter. A year from now, our collective (and I dare say individual) image of self will be vastly different than what it is now. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/well-need-a-trumps-economy-wall-on-the-mall-when-this-is-over/853321.md?page=2)