Sen. Elizabeth Warren was not happy when the Senate Banking Committee voted to advance Kevin Warsh’s nomination to lead the Federal Reserve, saying it would amount to a takeover of the Fed by President Donald Trump.

No surprise there. For today’s Democrats, everything Trump does is either illegal, a threat to Democracy, or fascistic.

But then Warren said that “The Trump economy is in real trouble. Inflation is up, job creation is down. The stink of stagflation is in the air, and President Trump is getting desperate.”

Is any of that true? After all, Warren is hardly a reliable source for economic information. (During the inflationary Biden years, she was busy blaming greedy corporations and “shrinkflation.”)

So, let’s consider the “stink of stagflation.”

The last bout of stagflation – defined as a slow-growing economy and high inflation – under Jimmy Carter popularized the “Misery Index,” which simply adds together the unemployment and inflation rates for each month as a proxy for the misery that everyday Americans are suffering.

Under Carter, it reached a post-World War II high of 22 in June 1980, when the unemployment rate was close to 8%, and inflation topped 14%. Then Ronald Reagan came in, cut taxes and regulations to turbocharge growth while the Fed clamped down on inflation.

Today, the Misery Index is 7.56. In Trump’s second term, it has so far averaged 6.98.

But under President Joe Biden? The Misery Index peaked at close to 13 in June 2022, and averaged 9.1 over his four years in office.

What’s more, the economy was slowing in Biden’s last year, with quarterly GDP growth going from 3.3% in Q3 2024 to 1.9% in Q4 to -0.6% in Q1 2025, before Trump’s policies took effect. Then it shot up by 3.8% and 4.4% in the next two quarters.

Last month’s job numbers came in “unexpectedly strong.” Real wages are growing under Trump after finishing down under Biden. The TIPP Poll’s Economic Optimism Index, while down in April, is still higher than it was for much of Biden’s term.

We’d say that, if anything, the economy today is still clearing the air of the foul odor that Biden left behind.

— Written by the I&I Editorial Board