It's too early to write off Trump

DONALD Trump's rumbustious presidency has been more or less the mix of confusion, contradiction, banality and confrontation I predicted four years ago, in a July 2016 report, The Political Economy Of Donald Trump. The economic buoyancy accompanying his journey into the White House, which continued, tax cut-propelled, for the first three years of office, is now seriously threatened.

The probability of a Trump defeat against Joe Biden in November has risen, but it is by no means certain. Much can change electorally in three months, especially in a nation riven by social and ethnic fault lines and where foreign crises (such as an autumn eruption with China) are likely to favour the incumbent. I would still wager an economic rebound taking Mr Trump - unpopular, divisive and unsavoury - to a second four-year term.

Mr Trump has shown less competence in the coronavirus crisis than many other leaders. Yet, US pandemic performance is in the mid-ground of international rankings, not at the bottom, as many allege. While the number of infections is high in absolute terms, the US mortality rate and infections per capita are lower than large European countries except Germany, which has roughly equal the US score. With 4.2 million cases and 147,000 deaths, the US has a mortality rate of 3.5 per cent - 440 per one million inhabitants. The UK with 301,000 cases has suffered 46,000 deaths or 15 per cent of infections (680 per one million inhabitants). The statistics for Brazil and India are respectively 86,000 and 32,000 deaths, out of 2.4 million and 1.4 million infections, a 3.6 per cent and 2.3 per cent death rate - 383 and 23 per one million inhabitants.