eOpicle

I have to hand it to Donald Trump: nobody markets an economic boom quite like a man still waiting for the economic boom to arrive. For roughly 20 months, Trump has been promising that prosperity is just around the corner—presumably hiding behind the same corner where affordable groceries, painless tariffs, disappearing deficits, and a Federal Reserve chairman willing to take presidential orders have all been patiently waiting. The boom is always imminent. It is approaching. It is tremendous. It may already be here, provided nobody checks the growth rate, the inflation data, the bond market, the federal debt, or the facial expressions of people paying their electric bills. Then August’s jobs report landed, and for one brief, shimmering moment, the White House appeared to have received exactly what it needed. The economy added 162,000 jobs. Unemployment remained at 4.1 percent. After a year in which monthly payroll gains had averaged only 31,000, this was a genuinely solid report—better ...