Donald Trump keeps telling voters, "We have the hottest country anywhere in the world." A BBC Verify fact-check ahead of the midterms found that the average middle-income household is about $1,700 worse off this year than it would have been, while the richest 1 percent are $12,560 better off. So yes, someone is having a very hot year. It just isn't you.
The Part Where He Is Technically Right
Let's give the man his due, briefly, because the facts demand it. The US economy is growing at an annualized 2.2 percent, and it has expanded about 3.2 percent since the end of 2024. That beats every other member of the G7 over the same stretch.
It also grew faster than the International Monetary Fund predicted right after Trump unveiled his "Liberation Day" tariffs on April 2, 2025. The IMF downgraded its forecasts at the time, blaming the tariffs for dragging on investment and consumer spending.
But Trump eased those tariffs considerably in the months that followed, which softened the blow the experts had braced for. So the economy dodged the worst case that the president himself made possible. Put that on a campaign mug.
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Here's what's quietly holding the whole thing up. American tech companies are pouring money into artificial intelligence, including building data centers across the country. Spending on data center construction by US businesses hit $5 billion in August 2026, almost double the monthly rate when Trump returned to office.
That is a lot of concrete poured so that chatbots can think harder. And it is a single point of failure. If that spending dries up, the engine of the "hottest country" sputters.
So the strongest part of Trump's economy isn't a Trump policy. It's a private-sector bet that could evaporate the moment investors get nervous. Hope the vibes hold.
Inflation Is Back, and It Brought Friends
Inflation is currently 3.7 percent. That's well below the 9 percent peak under Biden in 2022, sure. It's also higher than the 3 percent Trump inherited in January 2025. Going backward from a number you promised to crush is a choice.
Economists estimate inflation would be lower without the tariffs Trump has imposed since returning to office. Then there's the US-Israel war with Iran, which has scrambled global energy supplies. A gallon of diesel hit a record $6.52 in September, and diesel is what moves farms and factories and trucks full of groceries.
Beef and coffee are up since he took office. Eggs are down, which is the one bright spot, and I'd hold off on the parade. Retailers are already warning that pricier energy will make food costlier at the checkout.
The Jobs Machine Is Idling
Trump promised the tariffs would leave America "flooded with jobs." The flood has been more of a drip. Since he returned, the economy has added an average of 34,000 jobs a month. In the final year of Biden's presidency, that number was 122,000.
Manufacturing, the sector the tariffs were supposed to resurrect, employed 12.6 million people in September 2026. That's slightly lower than when his second term began. The factories did not come roaring back to save us.
Unemployment sits at a fairly low 4.2 percent, about where it was when he took office. But look at why. The immigration crackdown and deportation program has shrunk the available workforce, so the economy needs fewer new jobs each month to keep unemployment from rising. The number looks fine because there are fewer people to count.
Who Is Actually Getting Richer
Median household income did rise 2.6 percent in 2025 to $87,460, the highest on record after adjusting for inflation. Trump will wave that around, and he's entitled to.
But the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy looked at the combined effect of his tax cuts, the expiration of extra health insurance subsidies, and those higher-than-expected price rises. The middle fifth of households come out about $1,700 worse off in 2026 than they otherwise would have been. The poorest fifth are about $750 worse off.
The richest 1 percent? Better off by an average of $12,560, mostly thanks to the tax cuts. The Tax Foundation's estimates of the tariff burden on different income groups are broadly similar. So the cost lands on the middle and the bottom, and the checks go to the top.
The Bill Is Coming Due
Government borrowing has climbed in the second term, driven partly by those big tax cuts. The federal deficit hit $2 trillion in the year to September 2026, roughly 6 percent of GDP. That is a number you'd expect during a crisis, not a boom the president calls the hottest in the world.
Borrowing costs are rising along with it. Someone eventually pays for all of this, and it's usually not the people who got the $12,560.
The Dingo Take
Is this what "hottest country in the world" means now? Growth that's propped up by an AI spending binge, prices ratcheting upward, hiring cut to a quarter of its old pace, and a tax code that hands the richest 1 percent twelve grand while the middle class eats a $1,700 hit. If that's hot, so is a car with a blown head gasket.
Here's the thing. Nobody has to lie to make Trump's economy sound decent. GDP is growing, unemployment is low, incomes hit a record. The trouble is that he keeps selling it as a triumph for the average family, and the average family is the one getting poorer relative to where it would be. The headline numbers are real. The household experience is a different story, and voters can feel the gap every time they fill a diesel truck or open a grocery bill.
The midterms will test whether people believe the speech or their own wallets. Based on the receipts BBC Verify pulled together, the wallets have the better evidence.
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