Trump's job market promises fall flat as hiring collapses

Washington: The US job market has gone from healthy to lethargic during President Donald Trump’s first seven months back in the White House, as hiring has collapsed and inflation has started to climb once again as his tariffs take hold.

The job report showed employers added a mere 22,000 jobs in August, as the unemployment rate ticked up to 4.3%. Factories and construction firms shed workers. Revisions showed the economy lost 13,000 jobs in June, the first monthly losses since December 2020, during the Covid-19 pandemic. The new data exposed the widening gap between the booming economy Trump promised and the more anemic reality of what he’s managed to deliver so far.

The White House prides itself on operating at a breakneck speed, but it’s now asking the American people for patience, with Trump saying better job numbers might be a year away.

“We’re going to win like you’ve never seen,” Trump said. “Wait until these factories start to open up that are being built all over the country, you’re going to see things happen in this country that nobody expects.”

The plea for patience has done little to comfort Americans, as economic issues that had been a strength for Trump for a decade have evolved into a persistent weakness. Approval of Trump’s economic leadership hit 56% in early 2020 during his first term, but that figure was 38% in July of this year, according to polling by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. The situation has left Trump searching for others to blame, while Democrats say the problem begins and ends with him.

Trump maintained that the economy would be adding jobs if Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell had slashed benchmark interest rates, even though doing so to the degree that Trump wants could ignite higher inflation. Investors expect a rate cut by the Fed at its next meeting in September, although that’s partially because of weakening job numbers.