Is it still about the economy stupid?
That saying was the single-greatest Dick Morris creation during his role advising President Clinton. It is probably also the most synonymous with Bill Clinton's side of "I did not have sexual relations with that woman".
Anyway, back to the economy. It's good. In fact, it's the best in 21 years (speaking of the Clinton years). If it was about the economy in the 90's has anything really changed? Pew Research wrapped up their latest work on what issues matters most to us and the survey says... Maybe it's not all about the economy stupid.
What's notable is that as the economy has taken off over the past year, economic issues, while still extremely important, have actually declined in level of importance as political issues according to the average American. In fact, the economy is a close third in terms of our concerns.
On a scale from 1 to 100 here are the top concerns of Americans right now:
- 73%: Terrorism
- 72%: Education
- 71%: Economy
- 68%: Healthcare costs
- 67%: Social Security
- 66%: Medicare
- 62%: Environment
- 62%: Jobs
For years the economy and jobs were the top two concerns of Americans. With a good economy for the first time in over a decade, we're seeing that the economy and jobs, while still very important, aren't currently the most important concerns. It's a luxury of a good economy. It's interesting that terrorism is back to being the top American concern since the aftermath of 9/11 with education being right behind it.
What is notable about the list is that most of the issues we're concerned with don't come with easy answers. Terror, education, healthcare, Social Security, Medicare - these are all huge issues requiring massive policy shifts to make meaningful improvement. None that are likely to occur this year based the agenda items on tap (though one might argue that "The Wall"/border funding is a way to combat terrorism).
It's notable that immigration, which has been the central issue of focus since tax reform passed, is only a top concern of 47% of Americans and ranks on 15th on our priority list.