In October 1980, Republican presidential candidate Ronald Reagan stood before a televised national audience and asked a simple question to prospective voters, “Are you better off than you were four years ago?” The line focused voters’ minds on their wallets, their paychecks and the price of milk at a time when inflation rates were spiking, unemployment was rising, and the economy was flirting with recession. Reagan’s simple line also shaped a backbone of modern politics, an inherent altruism of campaigning that Americans will vote on issues of job security and paychecks more than any other issue.
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Flashpoints 2024: The rise and fall of the U.S. economy
The Washington Post’s Rich Matthews explores how the economy could impact the 2024 election
Fast-forward 43 years and American voters are still transfixed by the state of the national economy and how it impacts their daily lives. How will presidential candidates improve their paychecks, their working environments, and their ability to buy milk at the supermarket? To get a sense of these questions, The Washington Post went on a road trip to the Rust Belt and visited three families in three states representing three aspects of the American economy.
Flashpoints: The Economy is the second installment of a new Washington Post original series. Throughout the series, Post journalists are delving into key campaign issues surfacing in the 2024 election, from immigration to abortion, and climate change.
In this episode, The Post’s Rich Matthews takes a road trip to talk to small business owners about how the U.S. economy will shape the next presidential election. The trip includes discussions with a dairy farmer outside of Milwaukee, a restaurant owner in Pittsburgh, and autoworkers in Detroit just as plant strikes and wide questions on the future of American labor were flaring up.