It’s traditional in American politics to fret about “October surprises,” the unanticipated events that throw off years of plans and calculations. October has barely begun, but Hurricane Helene with its terrible destruction already has people wondering, so I wrote some preliminary thoughts about how to assess it at New York:
The upcoming presidential election is so close that it could easily be swayed by external developments. Perhaps a widening war in the Middle East will turn heads in one direction or the other, or possibly a dockworkers strike will shake the steadily improving economy and help Republicans. But the major event we already know about is Hurricane Helene, which took a horrific toll on a swath of coastal and inland communities stretching from Florida to Virginia. Confirmed deaths from the storm have already reached 175, with more likely as rescue crews sift through the wreckage and reach remote areas. Damage is expected to reach as much as $160 billion, making the storm one of the deadliest and costliest in U.S. history.
While the human tragedy of Helene remains front and center, it’s impossible to forget entirely that the nightmare storm hit late in a very close and highly consequential presidential election, and two battleground states (Georgia and North Carolina) were very much affected. Here’s what we know about the possible political fallout.
A lot of what we know about the impact of a major destructive storm on the willingness and ability of citizens to vote comes from Hurricane Sandy, which hammered parts of Connecticut, New Jersey, and New York in October 2012 during the run-up to a reasonably competitive presidential election. Sandy, to be clear, was much more proximate to Election Day (hitting the United States on October 29, eight days before the election) than Helene. On the other hand, early voting has become more significant since 2012, and mail ballots were going out in North Carolina when Helene roared across the area. The major study on the electoral impact of Sandy concluded that the famous “superstorm” did not have a significant impact on voter turnout in 2012.
There’s some talk in North Carolina of flooded polling places that may not be usable any time soon and fears of extended disruption of mail service. However, in all but a few isolated places, there should be plenty of time for recovery in the month before Election Day. Individuals, of course, may experience dislocations and psychological effects that might interfere with all kinds of civic participation, but it will be hard to anticipate the magnitude of such collateral damage.
The Washington Post took a look at the communities experiencing the most death and destruction from Helene and quickly concluded Trump country was most affected:
“As of writing, the federal government has issued disaster declarations in 66 mostly rural counties across four states: 17 in Florida, 11 in Georgia, 25 in North Carolina, and 13 in South Carolina. The declarations follow Helene’s path, from the section of Florida where the state bends along the Gulf of Mexico, through eastern Georgia and into the western Carolinas …
“Overall, counties in those four states that weren’t declared disaster areas voted for Joe Biden by a slight margin. Counties that were declared disaster areas backed Trump by a nearly 16-point margin. In all four states, counties that were included in the federal government’s disaster declarations were more supportive of Trump than were counties that didn’t receive that designation. In Georgia and North Carolina, non-disaster counties gave more votes to Biden.”
The disparate impact is most notable in North Carolina, a red-hot battleground state and the one where Helene’s impact was most heavily concentrated:
“Trump won North Carolina by a bit over one percentage point in 2020. If no one in the counties currently undergoing a Helene-related disaster had voted, Biden would have won by more than three points. If those counties are unable to vote at the same level as they did four years ago by the time Election Day arrives, that could spell trouble for the former president.”
But again, it’s a long time until Election Day.
People who have lost homes or other possessions to high winds and (especially) flooding and/or who lack power or other essentials for an extended period of time are especially dependent on emergency assistance and may be grateful if it arrives expeditiously. Beyond for those immediately affected, the perceived competence and compassion of government entities dealing with disaster relief and recovery efforts can affect how voters assess those in office, particularly in a high-profile situation like that created by Helene.
An American Enterprise Institute study of Sandy suggested that the Obama administration’s response to the storm was a major factor in the incumbent’s ability to win late deciders in 2012, topped by this finding: “Fully 15 percent of the electorate rated Obama’s hurricane response as the most important factor in their vote.”
At the other end of the spectrum, the George W. Bush administration’s tardy, confused, and seemingly indifferent response to the calamity of Hurricane Katrina in August and September of 2005 had an enduringly negative effect on perceptions of his presidency, even though it occurred nowhere close to a national election, as Reid Wilson explained:
“Voters, already turning skeptical over the mismanaged war in Iraq, blamed Bush for the unfolding disaster in New Orleans. Bush’s approval rating hit 45 percent in Gallup surveys the month after Katrina; they never again reached that high. The number of Americans who said the country was headed off on the wrong track rose north of 60 percent and stayed even higher for the rest of Bush’s presidency.”
While FEMA and HUD are typically the federal agencies most involved in disaster response and recovery, presidential leadership in a disaster always gets attention, too, and the risk of negative publicity or graphic displays of unmet needs won’t go away immediately. Bureaucratic backlogs in distributing funds and approving applications for assistance could cause voter unhappiness long after the initial damage is addressed.
Barring unexpected developments or a major series of screwups in the federal response, Hurricane Helene is likely to mark a big moment in the lives of people in and near the areas of devastation but probably won’t much affect their voting behavior. Obviously the campaigns and their allies will need to adjust their get-out-the-vote operations and show some sensitivity to the suffering of people whose lives were turned upside down. We can only hope the election itself and its aftermath don’t add violence and trauma to the damage done.
From THE ECONOMIST:
http://www.economist.com/world/na/displayStory.cfm?story_id=2910706
“Is the recovery losing momentum?”
“PITY the Republicans. No sooner had America’s jobs figures become rosy enough to brag about in campaign ads, than the pesky statistics stopped playing ball. According to numbers released on July 2nd, only 112,000 new non-farm jobs were created in June, far fewer than in each of the previous three months and less than half what analysts were expecting. After rising for four months, jobs in the politically sensitive manufacturing sector fell. The average work-week shortened and the unemployment rate is stuck at 5.6%. ”
[…]
“the number-crunchers also revised down the jobs figures for April and May a bit. And other evidence suggests America’s economy may be cooling somewhat. Durable goods orders (admittedly yet another highly volatile indicator) fell in May for the second consecutive month. Vehicles sales were decidedly lame in June. Measured at an annual rate, only 15.4m light vehicles were sold in June, a sharp fall from the 17.8m rate in May. And, perhaps most significant, several big chain stores, including Target and Wal-Mart, warned that June would be weak.”
“It is not all bad. For instance, consumer confidence looks robust (the Conference Board’s index rose to 101.9 in June, its highest level in two years). But for Mr Bush, even conflicting signals look dangerous. For the past few months, his campaign has been frustrated by how little his poll ratings have benefited from a string of uniformly rosy economic statistics. If the economic numbers are less rosy, then the poll numbers could yet go down.”
Marcus’ observation about the National Review is interesting, because Fox did try to spin it. The bottom-of-screen headline I saw was “Bush Was Right!” That’s pretty bad even for those guys. They must be getting nervous.
How bad news for “Shrub” is this? So bad even the partisans at NATIONAL REVIEW didn’t try to spin the 112,000-new-jobs release. They merely noted that at least the statistics were released at a time (=Independence Day weekend) when comparatively few people pay attention. And they are grateful for that.
http://www.nationalreview.com/kerry/kerryspot.asp
MARCU$
When it comes to something like the economy, the public’s perception comes mostly from their actual experience. We shouldn’t worry about Bush and the press hyping it, and by the same token there is no point in trying to play it down.
Kerry can win by properly explaining why the economy went into recession without blaming the American people. He can’t win by raising taxes just to end the recession. That’s BS and the smarty-pantses who think it works also drove the Democratic Party into a massive defeat in 2002. They should be banished from any position of decision-making, they should be exiled to a desert island until next February.
Sobering. Very sobering.
I agree with Ruy’s comments.
The bad economy is particularly visible when one compares job gains to population gains.
1) The index of Aggregate hours worked fell by 0.6 percent. This June number implies that there has been essentially no change in aggregate hours worked by employees since March 2004 and since 2002. Aggregate hours worked in manufacturing rose only 0.2 percent since March 2004. Aggregate hours in manufacturing are still more than 5% below their level in 2002 (Table B-5).
2) Recent Job growth is barely keeping pace with population growth. The HH survey’s employment population ratio was above 64 percent in 1998, 1999 and 2000. It fell to 62.3 in 2003 and that is also it’s level in June 2004. The unemployment rate has been constant since January 2004. (Table A-1) Just to get back to an E/P ratio of 64%, the economy would need to add 3,780,000 jobs.
3) From May to June 2004, The seasonally adjusted Weekly earnings of non-supervisory workers fell by $2.45 or about 0.5 percent (table B-3). This decline in nominal weekly wages came on top of a 0.2 to 0.4 percent rise in the cost of living. There is no disconnect between workers perceptions and the “reality” of an improving economy. Workers real weekly earnings fell by nearly one percent in June 2004. Their pay check’s buying power is declining.
4) Hours worked per week by non-supervisory workers has declined over the last year. Combined with the decline in the inflation adjusted hourly wage, the result is a declining pay check in real terms.The stability of aggregate hours worked since March implies that the increase in employment since March was accomplished by cutting back on the weekly hours of existing workers..
5) Occupations that are most subject to foreign competition and off shoring are still suffering despite the large reduction in the value of the dollar that should have improved the competitiveness of American workers. Household survey data implies that Employment of production workers fell 4.4% from June 2003 to June 2004 and office and administrative support occupations employment fell by 0.7 percent. Fast growing occupational categories were Construction (6%), Transportation and materials moving occupations (5.4%) and Installation and maintenance and repair occupations (3.5%). These are types of work that must be performed in the US (Table A-10)
6) The occupational up skilling of the employed work force has slowed. During the last year up skilling stopped. Over the last two decades professional, technical and managerial jobs (which account for 34 percent of all jobs) have accounted for about two-thirds of job growth. During the last 12 months, these high skill occupations accounted for only 22 percent of net job growth (Table A-10). Their share of total employment fell.
6) Industry payroll data from the establishment survey are consistent with this picture. Over the past 12 months, The fast growing industries were mining (2.9%), construction (2.8%), Janitorial services (3.4%), Temporary help agencies (10.3%), education and health services (2.1%) and Hotels and restaurants (2.4%). The Declining industries were manufacturing (-1.0%) and information and communications (-0.5%).
7) College grads have suffered along with everyone else. The employment to population ratio of college graduates was above 77 percent in 2000 and the first two quarters of 2001. The seasonally adjusted Emp/Pop for college grads had fallen to 75.3% in April 2004, 75.2% in May 2004 and 75.7% in June 2004. The E/P average for the second quarter of 2004 is 3.2 percent below its level in the first quarter of 2001. If we were to return to the first quarter of 2001 college grad E/P ratio, 1,250,000 extra college graduate would be employed. That is roughly equal to the number of bachelors degrees annually awarded by the nation’s colleges and universities (Table A-4)