Steve Rattner
@SteveRattner
Former head of Obama Auto Task Force. Wall Street financier. Contributing Writer to NY Times Op-Ed. Morning Joe Economic Analyst. 🌐
381 Following 131.5K Followers
Native-born labor force participation just hit its lowest August on record.
Despite the admin's claims, deportations are not freeing up jobs for Americans — 600,000 native-born workers have left the labor force in the past year.
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The Strait of Hormuz is still closed.
Doss: The strait of hormuz was not closed before this war.
Jennings: It’s not closed now.
Phillip: I want you to actually answer that question, because this is just emblematic of like a broader glossing over of reality. If you're claiming the strait of hormuz is open, why are there only ten tankers coming through the strait now?
Jennings: We don’t need as many to go through right now. Ultimately it doesn't matter, because we have a figured out how to move oil out of the region.
Phillip: So why haven’t gas prices gone down?
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Excluding the pre-Liberation Day bounce where companies increased imports ahead of expected tariffs, last month registered the worst U.S. trade deficit on record.
More evidence that Trump's blanket tariffs have failed on their own terms.
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The Fed is in a tough spot when it comes to setting rates.
Inflation is back up thanks to tariffs and the Iran War, but after years of solid numbers, job growth is now slowing.
It's too early to say for sure, but these numbers give off a "whiff" of stagflation.
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Biden pushed real wage growth into the black for his last year and a half as President, and they stayed there for Trump's first year.
Then came the Iran War, and real wage growth is now negative.
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Goods prices were flat or falling when Trump entered office.
Then came his "Liberation Day" tariffs, which have driven the spike in goods and overall inflation.
Last quarter, corporate profits reached their highest share of GDP ever recorded: 13.2%.
PCE inflation was still elevated at 3.7% last month, almost double the Fed's target.
Tariffs and in particular the unresolved Iran War continue to take their toll.
Q2 2026 GDP growth was down to 1.5% according to the second estimate released this morning.
That provides further evidence for an ongoing slowdown under Trump.
U.S. debt surpassed 100% of GDP this year and is on track to reach 188% over the next 30 years, according to new analysis by @BBKogan and @econjared.
They find the debt would instead be trending down toward 48%, were it not for the Bush and Trump tax cuts.
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Recent decades have been characterized by a two-speed economy as the wealthy pull away from everyone else.
In recent years, a new two-speed economy has emerged: economic growth driven by AI vs. everything else.
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The ongoing AI build out is significantly larger as a percent of GDP than the major previous construction booms in U.S. history.
Wages grew in step with the stock market for the first decades of the postwar boom.
Since Reagan, stocks have skyrocketed while wages stayed on the same trajectory: +9,686% vs. +1,196%.
That gap is a big driver of inequality — and a case for taxing capital more like work.
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President Trump decided to dip into the U.S. strategic petroleum reserve after his Iran War crashed global oil supply.
Now the strategic reserve is at its lowest level since 1982.
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In 2024, Trump claimed to have “a concept of a plan” to replace Obamacare and bring down health insurance costs.
No plan was ever enacted, but he still sabotaged Obamacare.
Now millions of Americans are paying thousands more on premiums every year.
My final @nytopinion Chart:
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President Trump promised there'd be no cuts to Medicaid.
Then he pushed through his One Big Beautiful Bill, which cut Medicaid by nearly $1 trillion and has already caused over 5 million Americans to lose health insurance.
Read my take in @nytopinion:
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Trump understood that high mortgage rates make homeownership unaffordable and committed to bring them down.
Instead, they’ve gone up thanks to his boost to inflation and the federal debt.
My chart for @nytopinion:
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Americans, particularly young people, are struggling to buy homes.
Trump said he'd make homeownership more affordable, but new home prices are essentially flat.
My @nytopinion Chart:
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Trump said he'd get gas prices below $2 a gallon.
Thanks to his Iran War and the crisis in the Strait of Hormuz, gas has spiked to double that level.
Read my take on Trump's broken promises in @nytopinion:
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Musk predicted $2 trillion in savings from DOGE.
The real number ended up being less than $50 billion.
This year, the debt passed 100% of GDP and is on track to break its WWII-era record in the next few years.
📸: @MSNOWNews @Morning_Joe
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