Yellen sees ‘disconnect’ between economy’s performance, Biden polling

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said she sees a “disconnect” between the good health of the U.S. economy and polling numbers that show many Americans fear a recession.

“I agree with you that there’s a disconnect, and I don’t have a simple and convincing answer, but Americans have been through a lot,” Yellen said in an MSNBC interview Tuesday.

A poll earlier this month found that 58 percent of Americans believe President Biden’s policies are making the economy worse. A separate poll found that more people trust former President Trump on economic issues than Biden.

Those results come as fears of a recession subside, inflation falls and unemployment remains low. The jobless rate was 3.8 percent in August — just 0.3 percentage points above its pre-pandemic level — and inflation has fallen to an annual rate of 3.7 percent last month from a peak of 9.1 percent in June 2022, according to the Labor Department.