A number of reputable economists have repeatedly said, over several decades, that all studies point to the fact that the President has a far smaller influence on the performance of the overall economy than most would believe. He’s not powerless, the President almost certainly has more influence on the economy than any other single person, especially in a time of crisis. But the contributing factors to a country’s economic status are so diverse and numerous, that attributing any success to the current President with any measure of certainty is foolhardy at best. I’d be more inclined to give credit to Obama, since he at least had a decent amount of time to exert his influence. And were I applying my own thinking hat, I’d say Trump’s behaviour, due to it’s volatile nature, is more likely to increase uncertainty in the notoriously fickle markets. But that’s the whole point, it’s all hypothetical. I’m not taking a political standpoint here, I’d be saying a similar thing if Hillary had won and one of her supporters was making this point. There is a lot of research that points to the conclusion that if you showed informed people a graph showing US economic performance, without dates to signify who was President at the time, they’d be unable to say what kind of President was in office at the time of certain trends. An enormous media profile, which the Office of the President naturally comes with, does not mean the effects on the ground are as concrete. I wouldn’t have any truck with somebody praising a hypothetical Clinton administration for this rise, and neither would I be okay with immediately blaming Trump if the economy took a downturn. There are indicators of how good a job a President is doing, but the Dow Jones is not a good one.
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