Despite inflation continuing to plague Americans, forcing them to spend more at the grocery store, at the gas station and on rent, President Joe Biden says things have already turned around.
While speaking with CNN’s Erin Burnett on Wednesday from Wisconsin, where he was touting recent investments in the state, the president was pressed on his handling of the economy and current voter sentiment that former President Donald Trump would be better suited to tackle inflation.
The president didn’t accept that, saying that the economy has already turned around and people just don’t realize it.
“We’ve already turned it around,” Biden said. “The polling data has been wrong all along.”
Biden said this after citing polling from the University of Michigan that shows people claimed they were doing well financially, but the nation wasn’t.
“They think the nation’s not in good shape, but they’re personally in good shape,” Biden said.
However, a CNN poll from last month found that a majority of Americans still felt their economic situation was poor (53%), as well as 70% who said the same for the nation as a whole.
As Burnett continued to push Biden on the issue, he admitted that people are spending more but said they have more money to spend.
“It’s real, but that fact is that if you take a look at what people have. They have the money to spend. It angers them and angers me that you have to spend more,” Biden said.
He continued saying that it wasn’t inflation but “shrinkflation,” with companies giving less product for the same price, that was the big issue.
“It’s shrinkflation…For example, a Snickers bar is 20% less for the same price. That’s corporate greed, and we’ve got to deal with it. That’s what I’m working on,” Biden said.
Since Biden took office in 2021, inflation has far outpaced wage growth despite some areas seeing record increases in pay. The phenomenon has seen Americans earn more money, but with prices for everything from eggs to cars skyrocketing, many haven’t benefited from those gains.
Biden continued to argue that he would be better for the economy than Trump citing both of their records as president.
“He’s never succeeded in creating jobs, and I’ve never failed. I’ve created over 15 million jobs,” Biden said.
The White House has pushed this statistic before. However, it fails to give context that Trump’s job record plummeted in his final year as president with the pandemic shutting down not only the country but also the world, and Biden’s 15 million jobs were boosted by roles temporarily lost during the shutdown.