Trump is a billionaire real estate mogul. Obama is a former Harvard Professor. Who do you think has more business acumen – Trump or Obama?
What makes you think Trump is in any way notable for success in business?
Cite?
Cite?
The one with the positive net worth has more business smarts than the one with negative net worth. Especially since the one with the negative net worth started off as a multimillionaire, while the one with the positive net worth started off middle-classed.
Who is more intelligent in general? Obama, by miles and miles.
Who has more business acumen? Its hard to say. Trump is only rich because his dad was rich and because Trump has helped the Russians launder money. Obama was never a businessman, but due to his intellect he could probably learn had he chosen that path in life.
I will give Trump credit, he is excellent at marketing. Trump is probably a genius at self promotion. So in that regards (who is better at marketing and self promotion), Trump is superior.
But this is an absurd question.
FWIW, a lot of genuine, self made billionaires who hate Trump have far better business acumen than he does. George Soros, Tom Steyer, Seth Klarman, Marc Cuban, Bloomberg, etc.
Both Obama and Trump probably have about equal amounts of business acumen. Obama is secure and self-aware enough to realize that so he doesn’t go into business much which means he has more business smarts.
Alternatively, impulse control and general intelligence are probably quite useful traits to business and I suppose if we compared the number of bankruptcies between the two, it would bear out that Obama has more business acumen. It might seem surprising to a Morlock but most people spend their entire lives not going through even one bankruptcy.
You and the Russians are the only ones. U.S. banks won’t give him credit.
Well, Obama’s net worth has clearly outperformed the stock market over his lifetime. Trump appears to have underperformed the market, though he was born into wealth. But I’m not quite sure that Obama’s wealth is actually business acumen, as opposed to being a part of his celebrity-like status.
Obama’s a lawyer. Lawyers don’t do “business”, especially not the Trumpian kind.
At first blush that sounds right, but is Trump really better at marketing and self promotion than the black man who was elected president of the United States twice?
Right now? Obama, hands-down.
Whatever business acumen Trump had, it’s doubtful that he still has it. Once he’s out of the White House, I bet his ‘business empire’ will go to shit, because it’s always relied on his being able to con and bully people, and being able to skirt the law without getting into trouble over it. That’s history now.
Obama, OTOH, is a pretty smart guy, and if he had to go into some sort of business venture, he knows how to hire good people and listen to them, which of course puts him way ahead of Trump.
Obama taught constitutional law at the University of Chicago, not Harvard.
I think so, because Trump’s success is orwellian.
Obama disappointed a lot of progressives because he governed like a new england republican. Lots of progressives felt we voted for candidate A and got candidate B. He presented himself as a progressive, and he governed like Susan Collins.
Trump on the other hand, his true personality is the exact opposite of the personality his base thinks he has.
His base thinks Trump is a hyper patriotic. extremely intelligent. talented businessman. Amazing dealmaker. Someone who brought dignity to America. Honest and moral.
In reality Trump is a treasonous footstool to any foreign power that bribes or black mails him. He likely has multiple mental illnesses (narcissistic disorder and dementia) combined with a low IQ. His businesses have failed and he is only rich because his dad was rich and the Russians use him to launder money. He is obviously incompetent at deal making (his wall for example, his battles with house democrats). Someone who brought great shame and ridicule on America. Trump is a sociopathic sex fiend who lies thousands of times.
So in that regards I’d wager Trump has the better marketing skills. If Obama convinced his base that he was a white female midget (rather than what he is in reality, a tall black male) then I would give Obama credit as the better marketer. Trump is able to convince his base that up is down, black is white, truth is fiction, etc. If Trump came out and said ‘I’m a black woman’, then the majority of his base would believe it.
however part of the issue is just who is judging them. I don’t think someone like Trump would survive int he democratic party because the base of the democratic party is not racist authoritarians.
Trump just seems to have unlimited resources, & he was not self made. So he has always operated with the upper hand, IDK how he would handle business not working from a power position. So it is hard to tell, he has a incredible advantage and can force things to his liking, so Trump may flop without that and be very poor. It’s appear to be a gambler that can always beat the house at roulette as he has the ability to always double his bet on black when he loses. Eventually the house can’t compete. And if he does go down, he just declares bankruptcy and walks away.
But then again it is possible that Trump is really good at it, but given his advantage he is not hesitant to use it, but would do just fine without it.
As for Obama, I don’t know.
It’s an apples and oranges comparison. Obama never went after the kind of business dealing Trump did so you can’t compare their records. It’s like asking which of them is a better scholar.
On the other hand, I think you can compare their level of success in their chosen fields. Obama went into academics and became a university professor; I would define that as a successful career prior to his entering politics. Trump went into business and there’s a lot of evidence he didn’t do well. He needed several large bailouts from his family and declared bankruptcy six times.
To be precise he’s a professor who graduated from Harvard. So you could arguably call him a Harvard professor in the same way you could call somebody a Harvard lawyer or a Harvard doctor. But I agree it’s misleading to describe him as a Harvard professor.
Trump’s “business” is fraud and money laundering, so a child running a legitimate lemonade stand has better business smarts than Trump.
Neither will Deutsche Bank, according to this morning’s NYT news feed. And it was one of the very last.
My question is, why does it matter in the slightest? It’s not a skill presidents actually need, despite what the corporate right wing wants to sell you as a belief.