Inflation, jobs and labor: The economy a new Democratic nominee will face

With his exit from the presidential race, President Joe Biden has set the stage has set the stage for his Democratic successor to answer for the country’s post-pandemic economic recovery.

With his exit from the presidential race, President Joe Biden has set the stage for his Democratic successor to answer for the country’s post-pandemic economic recovery. Biden’s statement, posted on X Sunday afternoon, touted his administration’s economic policies. “Today, America has the strongest economy in the world,” he wrote, adding that “we overcame … the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.” While the economic outlook appears somewhat more promising than the one Biden inherited in 2021, the economy is still a mixed bag, and the new Democratic nominee will have to navigate a precarious landscape ahead of the November election. The labor market remains reassuringly steady, even as job gains cooled modestly last month. The US economy added 206,000 jobs in June, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported July 5, a small dip from May’s tally of 215,000 jobs. The economy remains historically strong. June marked the economy’s 42nd consecutive month of job growth, the fifth-longest employment expansion on record. The unemployment rate moved slightly higher, up 0.1 percentage points to 4.1%. That marked the first time since November 2021 that the jobless rate was above 4% and also the third consecutive month that the unemployment rate increased.