Donald Trump, Barack Obama and economic growth

In his Sunday column, Wayne Allyn Root goes on and on about the alleged “winning” of Donald Trump. He writes, “Gross domestic product for the third quarter was just adjusted upward to 3.3 percent. That’s almost triple the eight-year average under Obama. The Fed is predicting fourth quarter GDP of almost 4 percent. That means in his first year, Trump beat all eight years under Obama.”

Of course, in order to get this triple number, he must include the first year of President Barack Obama’s term when the economy shrunk by 3 percent and unemployment was more than 9 percent, the highest in decades. This was due, of course, to the greatest economic downturn in almost 100 years — caused by a Republican president.

But after that, our economy grew at a a fairly constant rate of 2 percent.

Now here is the key part. That is the average rate of GDP growth in this country since 1880. And here is another key part. This growth has been continuous for the past 102 months, which is the third longest stretch in our history. Here is the thing, though. Growth of more than 2 percent is not the historical average, and such rates almost always end with a nasty downturn that throws a lot of people out of work as the economy shrinks.

So here is my prediction: If Mr. Trump stays in office for another two-plus years, he will get to preside over a serious downturn in the economy just in time for his defeat in 2020.