Logarithmic graph fucking LOL

Your whole argument hinges on the notion that the economy started to stagnate in 2016, when Trump/Bernie started getting momentum and looked like they could maybe pull it off. But the chart that you yourself just linked shows that the stagnation had already begun by early 2015, long before Trump or Bernie became a thing.

Anyway, happy new year!

Yeah, it's the standard way to display the DOW (and stocks in general) because interest/inflation is exponential since it's compound.

If I had your level of education and didn't understand compound interest I'd be really fucking embarrassed.



Started about half way through 2015, which, shocker, is around the time people start announcing their candidacy for the upcoming presidential election. Trump announced June 2015 and was a leader in the polls by July 2015. So... yeah. Your "counter points", when using the actual dates, fit my explanation.

Happy new year! Just turned here.

This post was edited by Thor123422 on Jan 1 2020 12:03am

context and facts... with the fake news group..
never gonna happen

No, it did not. Look, I highlighted it in your chart:



There were two short spikes to the bottom which the DOW recovered from within months, but other than that, it remained very steady from the beginning of 2015 right until Trump's election.

This post was edited by Black XistenZ on Jan 1 2020 12:11am

The first half of the year is within normal fluctuation. It's pretty clearly going up until at least a quarter of the way into the year, and you can clearly see there's points above the line you drew that are higher than any point before. If it was stagnant it wouldn't still be hitting record highs. It doesn't start to level off its maximums until between a quarter and half way into the year.

You can google "Dow record highs" and find lists of them.

Date

Close
Feb. 20 18,140.44
Feb. 24 18,209.19
Feb. 25 18,224.57
Mar. 2 18,288.63
May 18 18,298.88
May 19 18,312.39

March-May are trivial highs, but before that are not. So we can split the difference and say it started stagnating in March 2015. At that point we're quibbling about the stagnation starting a few months ahead of a primary with no clear leader of any party. People aren't exactly going to say "welp, the primary hasn't started, so let's hold off on being insecure till May"

This post was edited by Thor123422 on Jan 1 2020 12:18am

Maybe I drew the line a bit too far to the left, but the stagnation still definitely settled in before Trump even announced his campaign.

Sure, but my contention has never been that the effect is Trump-based. I said it's political uncertainty. Neither party had a front man for 2016 the way Obama was in 2012 for the Democrats. Maybe Hillary, but she was historically unpopular for what it's worth. Trump came out of a field of 20 viable candidates all taking shots at each other and nobody had any idea what was going to happen on the Republican side.

I acknowledge that the idea I'm presenting has some weaknesses. For one, since the elections only happen every 4 years it's hard to find a real contender for comparison. If we go back before 2012 it's either a different enough economy that it's not comparable or in the case of 2008 it was an economic shit show. So there's no "smoking gun" that will prove my idea. I just think it's fairly obvious when you consider that stock indexes follow a pretty clear exponential trend, Obama followed that trend for his entire presidency sans the stall during the primary and general at the end and the free-fall at the beginning, and the fact that you can see we are still around that same trend line even now after three years of "TRUMPS AMAZING ECONOMY". Also Trump has basically no mechanism to actually affect change on that day. The spike at "Trump Elected Here" actually supports my idea, because day one Trump didn't even have appointments for his cabinet and so no way to actually affect material change. When the economy turns around on the day of an election it's pretty good evidence that it was the election effecting the numbers, not the actual policies.

I think his tax cuts (which would have been done under any Republican president) should have kept us above the trend line but his trade war took the piss out of those gains.

This post was edited by Thor123422 on Jan 1 2020 12:32am

Well, I just dont see generic political uncertainty having such a dampening effect on the economy. Or perhaps I should phrase it from the opposite angle: I dont see how the certainty of now knowing who the next president will be can spur a stock market growth as explosive as what we saw following the 2016 election night. Releasing the investment which was held back due to the uncertainty imho cannot explain such a rally on its own, it just doesnt add up unless the markets addtionally like what this president-elect is promising on the economic front.

This post was edited by Black XistenZ on Jan 1 2020 12:32am

In which case the ball is in your court to show "that's too much". I don't know what a reasonable amount would be. I imagine after a full year of holding back there's plenty of people wanting to get in on the ground floor of the industries they planned to take off under Trump. Lots of time to plan and save. Just because there was a gain also doesn't mean there's a gain because one person was elected. I imagine most people who invested around that time had a "Hillary Plan" and a "Trump Plan". I mean, you're not going to add extra investment into windmills in your plan with a Trump presidency same as you aren't going to add extra investment into coal with Hillary.

Also added in edit.

I acknowledge that the idea I'm presenting has some weaknesses. For one, since the elections only happen every 4 years it's hard to find a real contender for comparison. If we go back before 2012 it's either a different enough economy that it's not comparable or in the case of 2008 it was an economic shit show. So there's no "smoking gun" that will prove my idea. I just think it's fairly obvious when you consider that stock indexes follow a pretty clear exponential trend, Obama followed that trend for his entire presidency sans the stall during the primary and general at the end and the free-fall at the beginning, and the fact that you can see we are still around that same trend line even now after three years of "TRUMPS AMAZING ECONOMY". Also Trump has basically no mechanism to actually affect change on that day. The spike at "Trump Elected Here" actually supports my idea, because day one Trump didn't even have appointments for his cabinet and so no way to actually affect material change. When the economy turns around on the day of an election it's pretty good evidence that it was the election effecting the numbers, not the actual policies.

I think his tax cuts (which would have been done under any Republican president) should have kept us above the trend line but his trade war took the piss out of those gains.

This post was edited by Thor123422 on Jan 1 2020 12:40am