53% of Americans say Trump has made the economy worse

Compared to just 24% who say the president has made conditions better. A new report shows the U.S. lost 92,000 jobs in February

---

To the extent that I cover economic statistics here at Strength In Numbers, it’s from a “here’s what historically predicts election results, so here’s what to pay attention to if you care about elections” point of view, rather than coverage that reads more as “here’s the new data and what it says about the economy.” For the latter, I recommend reading actual economists on the subject.

But the February 2026 jobs report released this morning (March 6, 2026) offers up a chance to recirculate some notable polling numbers on how voters are feeling about Trump’s economy, and about how he’s prioritizing economic policy vs other issues. So I thought, what the heck? Why not publish a bonus post to Strength In Numbers to really maximize the ROI on a paid subscription this week?

Let’s look at the numbers.

---

The U.S. lost 92,000 jobs in February

According to friend of the blog Joey Palitano, who runs the Substack, Apricitas Economics, the U.S. lost 92,000 jobs in February, and the unemployment rate ticked up to 4.4%:

Source: Apricitas Economics/Joey Palitano

February job losses were particularly bad in the manufacturing sector:

Source: Apricitas Economics/Joey Palitano

And the jobs data hasn’t been this bad since the mass firings during COVID-19:

This is, in a word, bad. It’s bad for workers, and it’s also bad for the party in charge of the government. These numbers may also be the better numbers we’ll see for a while, since the other newsy data today is on rising gas prices from the war in Iran, which are also sure to get worse.

So you might be wondering… do voters care? Do they blame their president for this? What impact will this have on politics? The answer is yes, yes, and probably a negative one.

Voters blame Trump 2:1 for a bad economy

First, consider that the University of Michigan’s Index of Consumer Sentiment is still stubbornly low, around where it was during peak inflation during Biden’s presidency, and worse than during peak-COVID:

Then, direct your attention to this chart from our September 2025 Strength In Numbers/Verasight poll, which showed 53% of U.S. adults said Trump’s policies were making the country’s economy worse off, twice as many as said Trump was making America better:

Between price hikes from tariffs, job losses from tariffs, and rising gas prices from foreign wars, I imagine that 53% numbers has increased over the last six months. I will update this number in our March poll.

And yet, Trump is spending basically no time at all trying to fix the economy. Voters have noticed: In a flash poll I conducted after the State of the Union address last week (yes, that was just last week!), voters said by a nearly 2:1 margin they felt Trump was “mostly focused on other things” rather than “the issues that matter most to me.”

Per the same poll, voters feel Trump is focused too much on immigration and deportations and not enough on jobs and prices or health care:

These numbers suggest a presidency that is off course, not just in terms of policy change, but policy focus.

---

In a CNN interview after Friday’s jobs report, Trump’s response to a question from Dana Bash was to simply deny that prices are going up:

But voters are not stupid. They can see prices going up, and they see coverage of jobs statistics. They blame Trump for that, and POTUS isn’t really doing anything to change course anyway.

That’s a bad combination for any president — but it’s an especially bad one for a president who won office because he promised to fix the economy. If the job numbers keep heading south and gas prices keep heading north, the political cost will only compound. At this rate, the Republicans could easily lose control of both the House and Senate in November’s midterm elections.