Catherwood LibraryILR School

A recent study by Jed Kolko, chief economist at Indeed, shows that the job market has improved more for likely Clinton supporters than it has for those likelier to have voted for Trump during the 2016 Presidential election. The survey relies on demographics rather than explicitly asking respondents who they voted for, to analyze improvements in employment among those who were more likely to have voted for Trump and those likelier to be Clinton supporters. The results showed a 0.8 point drop in the U6 for likely Clinton supporters, which measures not only unemployment but also those who have given up on looking for work, compared to a 0.6 point drop for those likelier to support Trump. Moreover, median weekly earnings for likely Clinton supporters have increased 2.9 percent since january, compared to 1.8 percent for likely Trump supporters. It’s unclear why the labor market is leaning in the opposite direction of economic confidence for liberals, but there’s still a lot of debate about how much economics actually influenced the 2016 election, and confidence in the economy is only weakly correlated with actual behaviors. Despite current across-the-board improvements in the labor market, the older and less educated demographic who are on average likelier to work in low-skilled jobs is at high risk of displacement from automation, causing many Trump supporters to have a lot of economic anxiety about the future.