President Bush's popularity is soaring in the aftermath of the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center and what even his critics agree was a forceful, confident address to the nation last Thursday.
In fact, George W. Bush's 90 percent approval rating is the highest in the Gallup Organization's 60-year history of tracking presidential popularity and one point higher than Poppy's rating in late February/early March 1991.
If only the consumer were so confident of his own well-being.
The Conference Board reported Tuesday that consumer confidence plummeted 16.4 points in September to a 5.5-year low of 97.6.
That matches the magnitude of the decline in August 1990, following Iraq's invasion of Kuwait, and in November 1987, following the Oct. 19, 1987, stock market crash.
In other words, as bad as things get, it's only worth about 15 to 20 confidence points to the consumer. (Consumer confidence fell 37 points in December 1973 in response to the first oil shock, but the Conference Board survey was bi-monthly in those days so the drop reflects a two-month change.) Consumers' assessment of both their present and future situations fell this month, by 19.3 and 14.5 points, respectively.
Deterioration in the labor market and weakening business conditions were behind the fall in confidence, which has been on the wane for a year.
What's troublesome about the September survey is that the responses received prior to the Sept. 11 attack showed "no significant difference" from those received after, according to Lynn Franco, director of the Conference Board's Consumer Research Center.
Which means the consumer felt lousy before his physical safety was threatened because his economic safety was at risk.
"When the unemployment rate went to 4.9 percent in August (from 4.5 percent in July), it broke the comfort zone," says Conference Board economist Ken Goldstein. "Consumers thought things might not get worse. They were wrong." Based on the deterioration in confidence that preceded the terrorist attack, the usually perky Conference Board issued an atypically glum pronouncement about the future.
"As the economic ramifications of Sept. 11 continue to reverberate in the coming weeks and months, and the number of layoffs continues to rise, the economy faces tougher times ahead," the Conference Board said. "While consumers have managed to keep the US out of a recession for several years now, that soon may no longer be the case."
Oh, my. Is there anything we optimists can hang our hats on without being accused of being a bunch of out-to-lunch Dr Panglosses? Here's a nugget. History suggests that how consumers feel about the president and how they feel about the economic outlook are closely allied, according to a study by Jim Bianco, president of Bianco Research in Barrington, Illinois.
Bianco examined all the major crises in the last 40 years, including the assassination of JFK in November 1963, the Iran hostage crisis in November 1979, Tiananmen Square in June 1989 and Desert Shield/Desert Storm in August 1990/January 1991.
"The relationship between the president's approval rating and consumer confidence not only holds during these crises, but in most cases actually strengthens," Bianco says. "Often a crisis that gives the president's approval rating a jump -- rally around the flag -- does the same for consumer confidence." If you think about it, the president's approval rating and consumer confidence are really the same question to most people, Bianco says.
"When you ask people to rate the job the president is doing, they aren't nitpicking about the job he is doing as a CEO," Bianco says. "They're ranking him on the state of the economy." The state of the economy isn't so good, yet the president's approval rating is on the moon. If historical precedent holds, "the massive jump in Bush's approval rating bodes well for consumer confidence next month," Bianco says, countering the Conference Board's assessment that confidence is going the way of the employment situation.
Bianco's argument could work in the other direction. If his thesis is correct, and consumers rate the president on their perception about their own well-being, economic and otherwise, then the surge of patriotism in support of the president may soon succumb to a more realistic assessment of the state of the economy.
The government is aiming to recruit 1,096 foreign English teachers and teaching assistants this year, the Ministry of Education said yesterday. The foreign teachers would work closely with elementary and junior-high instructors to create and teach courses, ministry official Tsai Yi-ching (蔡宜靜) said. Together, they would create an immersive language environment, helping to motivate students while enhancing the skills of local teachers, she said. The ministry has since 2021 been recruiting foreign teachers through the Taiwan Foreign English Teacher Program, which offers placement, salary, housing and other benefits to eligible foreign teachers. Two centers serving northern and southern Taiwan assist in recruiting and training
WIDE NET: Health officials said they are considering all possibilities, such as bongkrekic acid, while the city mayor said they have not ruled out the possibility of a malicious act of poisoning Two people who dined at a restaurant in Taipei’s Far Eastern Department Store Xinyi A13 last week have died, while four are in intensive care, the Taipei Department of Health said yesterday. All of the outlets of Malaysian vegetarian restaurant franchise Polam Kopitiam have been ordered to close pending an investigation after 11 people became ill due to suspected food poisoning, city officials told a news conference in Taipei. The first fatality, a 39-year-old man who ate at the restaurant on Friday last week, died of kidney failure two days later at the city’s Mackay Memorial Hospital. A 66-year-old man who dined
EYE ON STRAIT: The US spending bill ‘doubles security cooperation funding for Taiwan,’ while also seeking to counter the influence of China US President Joe Biden on Saturday signed into law a US$1.2 trillion spending package that includes US$300 million in foreign military financing to Taiwan, as well as funding for Taipei-Washington cooperative projects. The US Congress early on Saturday overwhelmingly passed the Further Consolidated Appropriations Act 2024 to avoid a partial shutdown and fund the government through September for a fiscal year that began six months ago. Under the package, the Defense Appropriations Act would provide a US$27 billion increase from the previous fiscal year to fund “critical national defense efforts, including countering the PRC [People’s Republic of China],” according to a summary
‘CARRIER KILLERS’: The Tuo Chiang-class corvettes’ stealth capability means they have a radar cross-section as small as the size of a fishing boat, an analyst said President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday presided over a ceremony at Yilan County’s Suao Harbor (蘇澳港), where the navy took delivery of two indigenous Tuo Chiang-class corvettes. The corvettes, An Chiang (安江) and Wan Chiang (萬江), along with the introduction of the coast guard’s third and fourth 4,000-tonne cutters earlier this month, are a testament to Taiwan’s shipbuilding capability and signify the nation’s resolve to defend democracy and freedom, Tsai said. The vessels are also the last two of six Tuo Chiang-class corvettes ordered from Lungteh Shipbuilding Co (龍德造船) by the navy, Tsai said. The first Tuo Chiang-class vessel delivered was Ta Chiang (塔江)