Biden helped fuel the inflation surge. Restoring Americans' purchasing power will require more production, fiscal discipline, and patience - not another spending spree.

America’s latest jobs report offers welcome evidence that the economy is still moving forward. Employers added 165,000 jobs in October, and earlier months were revised upward. 

Yet for families opening insurance renewals, paying rent, or buying groceries, economic growth can feel like an abstraction. A secure job is essential. A paycheck that leaves something after the bills is the goal.

Donald Trump did not inherit an affordable America. He inherited the accumulated damage of an inflation surge that had already transformed household budgets. His second-term tariffs cannot explain price increases that occurred years before they existed. That chronology should be beyond partisan dispute.

Responsibility for the original surge is shared, but not equally in every respect. Pandemic shutdowns disrupted production. Washington responded with enormous spending under both presidents. 

The Federal Reserve maintained emergency support too long. Then Biden’s $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan added another substantial dose of demand in March 2021, as the economy was reopening and supply remained constrained.

In my judgment, Biden bears greater presidential responsibility for amplifying that surge. Trump’s initial emergency response addressed an economy abruptly shutting down; Biden’s additional stimulus arrived during recovery. Those were different circumstances. Research supports a significant inflationary contribution from the combined fiscal response, although it cannot assign every price increase to one president.

But establishing responsibility does not settle the harder question: can anyone undo the damage?

Some individual expenses have doubled. The overall consumer price level has not: it rose approximately 31% between January 2020 and September 2026. That national average still represents a punishing adjustment, particularly for households whose budgets are dominated by necessities.

The uncomfortable answer is that no president can safely order the entire price level back to 2020. Broad deflation could accompany falling wages, business failures, and unemployment. Even inflation returning to normal would generally mean prices rising more slowly, rather than returning to their previous levels.

Restoring affordability therefore requires incomes to outrun expenses consistently. Particular costs can fall as shortages ease and competition improves. Across the economy, productivity and supply must grow enough to support better living standards without another burst of inflation.

Housing is an obvious place to begin. America needs more homes where people want to live. Faster approvals, more flexible zoning, smaller homes, apartments, and suitable building conversions can expand supply. Trump can simplify federal procedures and negotiate incentives for local reform, but states and municipalities control much of the process.

Offering buyers larger subsidies while homes remain scarce risks bidding prices higher. Helping construction become faster and less expensive addresses the underlying shortage. It also requires realistic attention to materials, skilled workers, and financing.

Energy demands the same practical approach. Encourage commercially viable production, generation, pipelines, and transmission. Reduce disruptions affecting global fuel supplies. Allow private capital to build the infrastructure a growing economy needs, including for artificial intelligence, while requiring large new users to cover the additional infrastructure costs they create.

Fiscal discipline is equally necessary. Another round of broad stimulus checks would offer temporary relief while risking additional demand and borrowing pressures. Unfunded tax cuts also carry fiscal costs. Calling a measure “tax relief” does not make its financing irrelevant.

Trump should seek a credible, phased agreement with Congress to reduce structural deficits. Eliminating fraud and waste belongs in that effort, but cannot substitute for confronting the largest spending commitments, ineffective subsidies, and costly tax preferences. Abrupt, indiscriminate cuts would bring their own damage.

He should also reconsider policies that add avoidable costs. Broad tariffs did not cause the original crisis, but can make recovery harder by raising prices for goods and production inputs. Strategic trade restrictions deserve strategic justification; an affordability agenda should scrutinize their household costs.

Finally, Trump should respect the Federal Reserve’s independence. Premature rate cuts could provide brief relief followed by renewed inflation. Sustained price stability offers a better foundation for eventually easing borrowing costs.

Can Trump end the crisis? He can improve the conditions for recovery. Can anyone restore every household’s former circumstances? No.

But Americans can become substantially better off. The route is more housing, dependable energy, stronger productivity, and responsible federal finances. Trump inherited the price damage. His opportunity now is to help paychecks catch up — and give families a reason to believe that working harder will finally leave them further ahead.

(Contributing writer, Brooke Bell)