Donald Trump needed to make "cosmetic changes" to the economy rather than grand and sweeping new policies, a Nobel Prize winner has claimed.
Paul Krugman suggested that only a few minor changes were needed to level out the economy left to Trump by Joe Biden's administration. Instead, Krugman suggested Trump had tried and failed to "gaslight" the American people with a slate of large changes and tariff policies which have seen the president's approval rating slump.
Krugman explained in his Substack, "Trump would be in much better political shape right now if he had basically continued Biden’s policies, with only a few cosmetic changes. When he took office inflation was on a declining trajectory. Consumer sentiment was relatively favorable at the start of 2025."
"Americans were still angry about high prices, but the inflation surge of 2021-3 had happened on Biden’s watch and was receding into the past. My guess is that many voters would have accepted Trump’s claims that high prices were Democrats’ fault and given him the benefit of the doubt about the economy’s future if he had simply done nothing drastic and left policies mostly as they were."
Instead, Krugman says the president tried to "gaslight the public" with recent speeches rejecting the idea there was an affordability crisis across the country. The Nobel Prize winner says that in order for Trump to criticise economic policies from the Democrats, he would have to admit the economy now is suffering, something the president has refused to do.
Krugman wrote, "A number of news analyses suggested that he would use the occasion to blame Democrats for the economy’s troubles. That was never going to happen."
"Trump did, of course, take many swipes at Joe Biden, as well as attacking immigrants, women and windmills. But to blame Democrats for the economy’s problems he would have to admit that the Trump economy has problems. And the speech was important because it revealed that he won’t make any such admission, and will continue to gaslight the public."
The so-called "affordability tour" was deemed to have gotten off to a "disastrous start" by Krugman, who added, "And it won’t get better, because while Trump insists that the problem is you, it’s actually him. And he isn’t going to change."
