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Whither Presidential Approval?
Author(s) -
Small Raphael,
Eisinger Robert M.
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
presidential studies quarterly
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.337
H-Index - 5
eISSN - 1741-5705
pISSN - 0360-4918
DOI - 10.1111/psq.12680
Subject(s) - presidential system , political science , politics , proxy (statistics) , political economy , law , economics , machine learning , computer science
Until recently, presidential job approval has been positively correlated with a healthy economy. Despite pre‐COVID‐19 sanguine macroeconomic indicators, President Donald Trump's job approval numbers appear to be quite low relative to those of his predecessors. Using a Bayesian model to infer latent presidential approval, we regress approval on consumer sentiment, finding strong evidence of a structural break commencing with the inauguration of President Barack Obama. We also find that the positive associations between presidential approval and consumer sentiment have weakened. Finally, we posit that a polarized political landscape may contribute to the changing of the meaning of presidential approval, which now appears to be a proxy for partisanship.